


Where the Mighty Live

by spaceleviathan



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: AU, Background Clint Barton/Natasha Romanov, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-30
Updated: 2013-02-01
Packaged: 2017-11-27 14:44:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 29,026
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/663200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spaceleviathan/pseuds/spaceleviathan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Thor receives a plea for help from Jotunheim, he gathers the Avengers and they set off to save a different world from war. There, they meet the crown prince of Jotunheim, who is determined to do everything in his power to stop his realm from being destroyed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [swoopswoop](https://archiveofourown.org/users/swoopswoop/gifts).
  * Translation into Русский available: [Там, где живет могущество](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2655590) by [souzern](https://archiveofourown.org/users/souzern/pseuds/souzern)



> This fic has been translated into Russian thanks to the wonderful iug! Check it out: ficbook.net/readfic/975361

Tony couldn't see anything for miles, excluding the ice.

The desert stretched before him, frozen and seemingly endless, whilst Tony kept a look out for anything that so much as twitched.

JARVIS was trying to align his sensors to data based on guess-work, since Thor had informed Tony that Frost Giants, as their name would imply, did not have body heat. JARVIS was keeping a motion sensor as well, but with the threatening storm clouds drawing in from the west Tony wasn't sure how useful the computer would be.

He was flying across the skies in Jötunheim, which was a largely blue, black and white landscape. This did nothing to help Tony find the inhabitants, since he'd been told they were largely blue, black or white themselves. The Frost Giants were blue, the vargr were white, and the 'sons of Hræsvelgr', which Tony had been warned were giants disguised in the form of great falcons, were black. They roamed the heavens at night when the sky was pitch dark for camouflage. Why they bothered to wait was lost on Tony, since Jötunheim was far enough away from their sun to be consistently dark throughout the day.

The Avengers had been here twelve hours already, having claimed a base in a small abandoned ice hut they'd found near where Heimdall had dropped them from the Bifrost. Since arrival they'd been looking for the Frost Giants, with absolutely no success to speak of.

"Can't see anything," Tony told the group across his comm-link. "Just some more snow and a storm heading our way."

"Come back then, Tony." Cap's voice replied, but Tony was way ahead of him. "What about you, Thor?"

Thor replied in negative, in the disgruntled manner the Avengers had been forced to get used to for the last half-week, ever since the distress call had first come through. "I see neither hide nor hair of a Jötun."

"Thought you said they didn't have hair." Clint replied with chattering teeth, still finding the energy to be snarky even when he was freezing his balls off.

"How can people so big hide so well?" Tony asked, because it was a conundrum which had been frustrating him for the last eleven hours.

"I presumed they'd have been expecting us, having asked us to come." Cap mused, and Thor replied with a strange noise, almost like an awkward cough.

"Something you're not telling us, big man?" Tony asked.

"Guys," Natasha snapped, and the tone of her voice made Tony instinctually push his thrusters that bit faster.

"There is someone here." Clint murmured quietly, and Tony could envision the Hawk from the vantage point Tony had found for him - the tall ice spire in the ruins of a small town not too far away from where Natasha and Bruce were holding down the temporary fort.

"What do they look like?" Cap asked through panting breath as he ran back to the base.

"I think it's a Frost Giant. Big and blue and half-naked. I guess they don't feel the weather. Wish I couldn't."

"Stop whining, we're all cold." Tony returned, though he was marginally less so with his suit regulating his internal environment nicely. "Do you want me to come pick you up?"

"No, I've got a good shot from here."

Tony was still a few miles away, having not been able to stray as they'd been reporting back to base every few hours to make sure they were all coping in this strange new environment.

Iron Man landed next to Natasha a few minutes later. From where she stood, huddled up in her coat but tensed for a fight at the entrance, they could both see the figure slowly approaching across the wide expanse of ice.

Whoever it was had paused when they'd seen the suit land, but continued on after a long contemplative moment. God only knows what they made of him, something loud and fast and alien hurtling across the sky, but kudos to them, it didn't deter them. They must have been absolutely desperate for help.

Thor came from the opposite direction Tony had arrived from, going straight over the head of the Frost Giant to stand beside his mortal team.

Tony lifted his visor briefly to peek a look inside the hut they'd discovered, to Bruce who was standing indoors, looking over old maps of the planet that Thor had provided for them, searching for any possible nearby areas the Jötuns may potentially be. The maps were woefully incomplete, likely out of date, and worn and tattered and torn from over-use. Apparently they had been utilised during war-time, which would explain the angry rips where sharp Asgardian blades had been stabbed straight through the parchment.

Bruce looked up, smiling to Tony warily, before coming forward to be there when their visitor greeted them. Tony lowered his face plate again to concentrate on the approaching alien.

Cap was running from the east and Tony could see the vivid colours of his uniform coming over the horizon, so the only one missing was Clint. Clint, however, was back up if anything went wrong. Not that Tony was worried. From the sound of it, the Jötuns _really_ needed some help. What for was unclear, even to Thor, but he had offered his and the Avengers' assistance when the message had initially come through to Asgard the week earlier.

The Frost Giant, and they could clearly see that was precisely what it was the closer it came to them, was _huge_. It was in the name, Tony mused. It was no less than ten-feet tall, likely more, with blue skin lined with pale ridges, peppered with white scars, and eyes a bloody red glowing in contrast to its surroundings. Nothing else on this planet they had encountered so far was that same startling colour - not that they'd seen much more of anything than ruined ice cities and endless hoarfrost.

It was hard to see how something so large could need help from six puny creatures from other realms - even if one was a god and the others were rather special in their own various ways. Really, the only one of the six who seemed like they'd stand a chance against these creatures was the Hulk, who, at this moment, was looking pretty cold and pathetic under his beanie-hat and insulated coat.

Cap made it just in time to greet the Jötun, who spared the super soldier a glance, before looking critically at the other members of the entourage. Thor he saved for last, eying him with great distaste.

"This is how Asgard replies? With three humans, one metal creature and a single Asgardian warrior?"

"Yeah, we look like a train wreck, I know," Tony said, seeming to startle the Frost Giant who rounded on him defensively. Tony held up his arms in a show of peace, biting on his tongue to hold in a spurt of ill-timed laughter.

"My father was reluctant on the matter," Thor spoke authoritatively, in a way Tony remembered from their first meeting but not since then. It made the god seem larger, more worthy of the title 'prince'. For a moment, the Avengers could practically see the way his blond oozed royalty; a man used to getting his way and being treated with respect. "'Tis I alone who answered your call, and these are Midgard's finest warriors - strong and brave people willing to help you in your time of need."

For a moment the Jötun considered these words, weighing them up carefully, and Tony became aware, as they all were, of the weapons fastened around the belt on the alien's hip. Thor had told them that Jötuns were not in the habit of carrying weapons when they had elemental magic over the ice in their land which would fashion itself into arms for them when it was needed, but it seems matters had since changed.

"Then, on behalf of my king, I shall be the first to thank you for answering at all."

"Our pleasure." Steve said, putting himself forward to represent the team. "We're happy to help."

Well, Tony and Bruce had to be persuaded with no shortage of scientific promise and alcohol involved, and Clint was bullied into it by Natasha, but sure, happy to help. The Avengers motto. Along with taking names and kicking villainous ass.

"What ails Jötunheim?" Thor asked then, and the Frost Giant beckoned a hand, leading them away.

"We are under attack," He explained as Bruce rushed to gather up all the maps he'd brought and Natasha and Steve collected their bags. "The war started three months ago, but we do not know for certain why they have decided to assail our realm, we believe they are from Musspelheim. Due to their nature, we are not capable of defeating them alone."

"But you guys are _massive_." Tony marvelled, rolling his eyes at the look Steve and Natasha sent him. "Alright, I'm shutting up. I'll go get Legolas." He said to them, which was about as apologetic as Tony Stark got, before shooting off into the sky.

"I didn't realise how bloody tall it was until it stood next to Thor." The first thing Clint commented on was exactly what Tony had been thinking. He was packing his weapons away when Tony grabbed him. "I don't think I want to meet whatever have been whooping their ass."

On the other side of the town ruins were several vargr, as white as had been promised, blending in effortlessly to the surroundings. On top of all but three of them sat several other Jötuns, who were, to Tony's alien eyes, all strikingly similar. They watched quietly, judgingly, as the humans approached.

"Actually, I think I'll catch a ride with Bender," Clint started, not liking the looks of the wolves in front of him, but Tony was back up in the air and waving down at him before Clint could grab onto him again.

The Frost Giant climbed on top of one of the huge wolves, watching dispassionately as the humans warily eyed them. Bruce looked a little green at the thought of being near such vicious looking creatures, and when Bruce looked a little green that wasn't always metaphorical.

Thor helped Natasha on top of one, before giving Clint a boost behind her. Steve had helped Bruce clamber on to another, whilst Thor waited to see his friends safely on top of the beasts to turn back to the Jötun.

"Where are we going?" The Asgardian asked, and the Frost Giant pointed north.

"There is an encampment several miles that way, where our prince is at the front lines. You will be able to speak to him in detail concerning what has been going on. I cannot tell you much more than I already have."

The details had been vague so far, no answers making themselves clear about what precisely was going on, but Tony was coming to realise this Frost Giant was simply a warrior, a soldier, and not privy to more than the bare basic information. Their audience with  the prince of Jötunheim would hopefully turn out to be more useful.

"Lead on." Thor gestured grandly, and the vargr charged forward. Clint yelled and Tony saw Bruce cling on to Steve like a life-line, and he laughed before speeding after them. Thor, with Mjölnir, shot through the skies beside him.

It took an hour to reach the camp, and even then it was almost invisible; craftily hidden among the natural icy spires and twisting landscape which defined the realm. Closer now, approaching the gates, they could see the enormous centurions on guard, eying them and pointing their weapons until it became clear who they were.

"Inform the prince of their arrival," One called up, as the gates opened wide to grant them entry as they dismounted the white wolves. "He will see them immediately."

The camp was a hive of activity, with Jötuns milling around the place busily, weapons constantly being made and sharpened and checked, food being rationed, and talk urgent and restrained. Those who were not bustling around were standing watch, peering over the walls, continually alert and ready to raise the alarm. Once more, the Avengers wondered what had put these battle-ready creatures into such a tizzy.

They were being led towards the centre of the camp, where a building of ice, not unlike the one they'd found upon their arrival in the realm, had been constructed. From it emerged a Frost Giant much like the others in build and shape, along with three more trailing behind him. The only thing marking him apart was the gold at his neck, something which put him above the rest of the commoners at the camp.

Thor stepped forward, nodding his head in solemn greeting. The prince of Jötunheim returned the gesture.

"Thor of Asgard. We are privileged to have been sent such a fine warrior."

"We see it as a privilege to be sent for, Helblindi of Jötunheim." A lie, and they all knew it. The prince seemed especially aware from the strain to his expression, but Thor _had_ come, which appeared to count for enough to not verbally point it out.

"The king is apologetic upon not being here to greet you, son of Odin." Helblindi stated calmly. "But he has matters in the capital which require his attention. I, personally, must apologise for not being there sooner. Your arrival came as a surprise to us."

Thor did not comment on it, as he glanced to the three Frost Giants flanking Helblindi's sides. "What of your brothers?"

"They are at other encampments, fighting to keep the invaders away from the capital. Býleistr is travelling from the east to inform the king of the missive I sent, before coming to join us. He shall be upon us within hours."

"What are we facing?" Thor wondered, "And why have you need of us?"

Helblindi went inside the building, and the six Avengers followed him. They left the talking to Thor for the moment, as in this world the god carried much more influence than any of the mortals. Steve may be the leader of the Avengers, but Thor was the Prince of Asgard. Here, that meant an awful lot more than back at home.

"We suspect they are from Muspelheim, as they have weapons of fire unlike we have ever seen. They cause relatively little harm to our land, since we gain more use from water than they do, but if we are touched by such flame we suffer immeasurably." Helblindi looked steadily at Thor as he continued, "We have lost too many on the battlefields, but many more through mercy killing. 'Tis not life for burnt Jötuns of ice."

"So you need someone a bit more fireproof to help you." Clint voiced, and the Jötun prince paid attention to the humans in Thor's company for the first time. Whilst he didn't give voice to his opinions, his face said it all eloquently.

"They are fine warriors," Thor spoke in their defence. "Although they seem of strange shape when buried in their many layers. They simply have to defend themselves from the cold. Likely, they will be glad of some fire to warm them."

The prince managed a smirk. "Well then, they shall not be disappointed."

\--

The Avengers had formed when a crazy blond Asgardian called Amora the Enchantress came down to Earth one day to raise hell with her axe-wielding body-guard Skurge, who was more bear than he was man.

She'd brought with her an army of the god-damn un-dead, and had Tony not been there to see it he would not have believed it. The bastards were a pain in the arse to keep down, since they were _already dead_. They didn't make it out of New York, thankfully, but the mess they had made was still being cleared up.

It wasn't until Thor came down to bash some heads together that the humans really started to get where the witch was coming from. She'd been ranting tirelessly about the Asgardian prince, something about getting back at him or making his hers or staking her claim or pissing on her territory or some other crap that Tony couldn't care less about, so it was nice to have the object of her attention distract her for a while.

Thor and Natasha had been the ones to get Amora to yield (Natasha was scary when she was avenging her boyfriend), and the Hulk had smashed down Skurge, ruining Tony's brand new floor in his brand new penthouse in his brand new tower as he did so. Bruce had been a little sorry about it, but the Hulk had been gleefully unrepentant.

Thor had been the most embarrassed, stating he was sorry he'd been the reason all this had happened. Clint - who'd been there when Amora had arrived on Earth and had been the first victim to her hypnotic stare - had said it was no biggie. SHIELD hadn't been happy, stating it had been a _very big fucking biggie_ , but Tony told Thor to ignore Fury. Clint accepting Thor's apology for being brainwashed meant a hell of a lot more than Fury trying to play the blame game.

"Fangirls are batshit crazy." Tony had told him, to which Thor replied that Midgardian language had become particularly inventive with its expletives in the last few hundred years.

He'd come straight back to them after he'd dropped Amora off in Asgard, because Tony had promised Schawarma and movie night, to celebrate the continued existence of the world and his new collection of bros.

\--

The prince Býleistr arrived in the early hours of the morning, but the Avengers had been provided beds before then after a long meeting with Helblindi. He'd explained over a much better map of Jötunheim where and when all the attacks over the last three months had occurred, spouting stats and battle details at hectic speeds which were a struggle to keep up with.

The Jötuns were being assailed almost daily at one location or another, and since then they'd built the two main encampments - Turmilr and Yåtnir, and they were at the former now - to ward off the enemies focused on trying to get to the capital, where most of the Frost Giants in this area of the realm had been evacuated to. The king was there, watching over his subjects and making sure things like rations were provided fairly, and that daily life continued on so food and the like were constantly available for all and no one started panicking.

Many scouts had been sent out to try to investigate the enemy armies, but none had returned alive or coherent or uninjured. Too many Jötuns had simply been wiped from the face of the planet; nothing more left behind than a scorch mark over the snow to show they'd ever even existed.

"We are not strong enough to fight a full-scale war against anyone, and we were never in a strong position if Muspelheim was the enemy even before the Casket was tak-" The prince stopped, eyes flickering up to where Thor leaned on the table opposite him. He didn't finish his sentence.

Later that night, the Avengers were provided with wolf-hides to sleep on top of and under, and they all thankfully rid themselves of their top-most layers (Tony especially happy to be out of the suit for a little while) before bundling themselves down for some sleep. Thor and Steve took first watch, none of them completely trusting around the Jötuns no matter how much they claimed to have need of the alien heroes, so shifts had been decided upon long before the Frost Giants had found them.  Thor and Steve, being the most noble of any beings in existence, had offered to go first. The others were most certainly _not_ noble enough to argue and were simply glad of the chance to finally sleep.

Natasha and Clint woke them up perhaps six hours later, Clint telling Tony it was his job as the green giant's BFF to draw _him_ out of unconsciousness. Tony wasn't cautious enough to care as he yelled for Bruce to get his lazy ass out of bed. Bruce was just a spectacled teddy-bear after all, who appreciated being treated like something more than delicate glass. However, the rest of them, bar Thor, were still getting used to the idea that it literally took _being shot in the face with a ball of fiery green magic_ to piss him off, as Amora had learnt the hard way.

Býleistr wasn't a hard Jötun to spot. Whilst many of them seemed to be of similar height and body-type to Helblindi, Býleistr was completely atypical. He hunched over on himself, body mass seemingly even too massive for a _Frost Giant_ to properly deal with. He put the Avengers more in the mind of the Hulk if he went to the gym a bit more.

He was made especially terrifying by his burning red eyes, one of which seemed cloudier than the other. That was likely due to the scar which cut across the corner of it, running straight through his face, dissecting his mouth and then down to his chin. On his back a sword built for his stature rested, the metal glinting sharply under the light of the ever-present moon.

"Whoa, that's a big alien." Clint whistled lowly, mostly to himself, though they all agreed.

Thor, acting the diplomat no one had previously suspected him capable of, walked straight up to the newly arrived prince as he conversed with his brother to greet him appropriately.

"Býleistr, son of Laufey." He bowed his head as he had to Helblindi, and, after a moment, the giant did the same.

"I was told it was you, Thor Odinson." The large creature spoke, voice more a grumble then a tone. "It was hard to believe. My father was equally surprised to hear of your presence."

His eyes were cold, begrudging Thor something. Perhaps his heritage, since the Avengers knew something of the war that Asgard and Jötunheim had engaged in a couple of thousand years ago. Or perhaps there was something more behind it. Thor looked a little too repentant for it to be anything but recent.

"What news of Yåtnir?" Helblindi distracted his brother, and the larger giant looked strained.

"They have relocated. The attack has left them weak. They are moving the injured to the capital, whilst those who can still fight make their way here."

"Attack?" Steve couldn't help himself but ask, and Helblindi nodded solemnly.

"Word was sent not two hours ago of a frightful assault."

"Is that where the heir apparent is?" Thor said suddenly, making Býleistr look even more weary.

"He has disappeared." The Jötun directed towards his brother, who only nodded stiffly, acceptingly but not happily. "He, and apparently seven others, who had left earlier that evening on a scout."

Helblindi snarled suddenly, smashing his fist into a wall of ice to his left.

"I told him not to! _Father_ told him not to!"

"Since when does our brother ever listen?"

"He should have sense by now. We cannot afford to lose him."

"He will find his way to us, eventually." Býleistr tried to reassure his sibling. "He is more than capable of defending himself."

"From what I have heard of the crown prince he is the most likely to come from such a venture alive." Thor butted in, and Helblindi's lips thinned. Other than that, he showed no reaction.

"We will make space for the coming warriors, and I will send out a trope to go looking for our fool of a brother. Have you told father?"

Býleistr shook his head. "He would not have taken it well."

Helblindi turned to the Avengers, and stating they were free to return to sleep. "For now we are capable without you."

"Perhaps we can go find the prince." Thor offered, and Steve quickly agreed. Clint groaned, turning around from his determined path back to where the furs waited.

"It would be an honour."

"And we're faster, since two of us can fly," Tony pointed out. "Just tell us which way he went and we're gone."

"The metal is speaking. An enchantment?" Býleistr wondered aloud, looking to Thor inquiringly. Tony lifted his face-plate and grinned.

"You never seen a suit of armour before, Iceman?"

"Tis a mortal inside." He blinked, before shaking his head. "Have they been warned of the danger of such a quest?"

"We're safer than you are." Steve said strongly, and Tony agreed.

"Fire'll have a tough time getting to me, at least."

"You _did_ call us here to help," Thor reminded them. "And this is a pertinent way of beginning."

Helblindi eventually nodded, before gesturing for his brother to head towards the centre of the camp. Before they left, he told the Avengers, "He will have headed west. If you go far enough you will find evidence of the fire attacks. Follow them, and that will lead you to my brother." He sighed heavily, looking more tired than he had only a few hours before, worried as he was for his kin. "It is possible you will not find him."

"We will." Thor said firmly, determinedly, with Steve nodding next to him. Had Helblindi not been a Frost Giant capable of freezing very skin at a touch, now would have been the part where Thor put a hand on the prince's shoulder in a show of solidarity.

"Do not make promises you cannot keep, Odinson." Helblindi warned, before disappearing after his bulky brother.

"How will we recognise the heir?" Bruce asked sensibly when they were all ready to go - armed, suited, and mounted on vargr once more. Now they were a fair distance from the camp, Thor felt free to laugh lowly and smile.

"You will know him." He answered, before setting to the sky, Tony following after.

\--

Upon finding the scorched ground, where fires were still burning unnaturally despite the lack of fuel, they had split up into pairs for a little investigative work. Natasha went with Steve, Clint with Thor and Tony with Bruce. Bruce was poking at the ground whereas Tony was flying a small radius around him. He didn't feel bad leaving Bruce alone for a time, since if there one was of them who didn't need protecting, it was the seemingly innocuous Dr. Banner. They had yet to find something which actually caused the Hulk any damage at all, which the Avengers were viewing as a blessing, no matter how much SHIELD thought the exact opposite.

"I think I found something," Bruce said after a little while, and when Tony had landed next to him he held up a gold ring with a red gem inside. One which looked awfully familiar to a certain type of eye colour, and the gold matching a piece of jewellery around another Frost Giant's neck.

"Looks too expensive to be just a common soldier's." Bruce pointed out morosely, and Tony shrugged.

"Perhaps he just lost it?"

Bruce glanced to his feet, where there were definite _people_ marks. He winced.

"Are we going to be forced to tell the king of Jötunheim and his two scary sons that the crown prince is dead?"

Bruce looked wretched at the thought.

"They won't kill _us_ , right? Don't shoot the messenger, all that."

"I don't know." Bruce replied helplessly. "But this is bad either way."

"No kidding."

"We found a ring," Bruce said into the comm-link.

"A pricey one." Tony supplied when Steve replied with a hopeful plea of 'could be anyone's'.

Suddenly Tony found himself being thrown backwards, forced down by strong hands grabbing him from behind. He caught a glimpse of blue as his attacker spun him around and pressed him face-first to the ground. A heavy foot landed on his back, enough to keep him down even with the suit, as whoever it was turned towards Bruce.

Tony twisted his head to spot the other foot which wasn't balancing on his back, and saw Jötun colouring and their appropriate markings.

Bruce was speaking, saying something along the lines of, "We've come here to help you."

The Frost Giant hadn't moved from Tony, obviously not considering Bruce enough of a threat to restrain. He was wrong, but it was an easy mistake to make when Bruce was all curly hair and big brown eyes and adorable under his knitted cap and thick scarf and gloves.

"Mortals are useless in this war." The Jötun spat furiously. "You are as liable to die in the fire as we. You should not have come here."

"What are you going to do about it?" Tony managed to get out, and the giant stamped down on his back.

"Are you a mortal inside of there as well?"

"Yep. And we're not your enemy, so you might as well let me up."

It took a moment, probably involving eyeballing Bruce a little more, before the Jötun stepped away. Tony struggled to his feet awkwardly, jerky in the suit, and was met with something of a surprising image when he lifted his visor and looked up to greet the Frost Giant properly.

Red eyes, as usual, and blue skin with pale ridges - that was all present and correct and accounted for. The spear he held was clearly hastily built, being held together with string and not much else, but it looked deadly efficient. The Jötun's need for more than ice weapons had long since made itself clear. However, there were many more differences about this Jötun before them than there were similarities with his kin.

For one, he wore a lot more layers than his fellows. Though his arms were uncovered and he didn't seem to feel the icy wind, he wore an intricately patterned tunic and trousers. He also had a head of pitch-black hair, which severely split him apart from the other members of his species who had strange ridges lining their skull instead. It was long - reaching his shoulders - and worn in a loose and hurried tail.

Perhaps most importantly, or most obviously, was his height. He was tall, ridiculously so, but no more than Thor was tall or Cap was tall, if even that. Compared to the other Jötuns, quite especially Býleistr, he was practically a dwarf.

"My name is Loki." He introduced himself, startling Tony out of his staring.

"I'm Bruce Banner."

"Tony Stark." Tony managed.

"It is noble of you to come," Loki said, though he didn't look happy to see them, as no one else on the planet had been so far. "However foolish a decision it was."

"That's kind of out MO." Tony agreed readily.

"What business do you have so far from the camps?"

"We're searching for the prince." Bruce handed over the ring for Loki to inspect. "Does this belong to him?"

Loki studied the jewel for a moment, before slipping it away into a hidden pocket of his ensemble. "I will return it to him." He confirmed, before glancing around. "You should go back to your companions before they return. _They_ are close-by."

"'They'? Who's 'they'?"

"And how do you know they're close?" Bruce completed.

"I can sense their approach." Loki replied enigmatically, before glaring at the mortal duo. "Are you not gone yet?"

"Obviously not."

Loki's stink-eye only encouraged Tony's grin.

"Who is it? We can call in back up." Which was something Bruce was already doing through the comm-link. Loki rolled his blood-red eyes heavily.

"Are all mortals so impudently obstinate?"

" _You're_ the one trying to face off a pack of fire-wielding bastards trying to burn your race alive without back-up." Tony pointed out, coming to stand alongside Loki who was staring off to the horizon. Bruce came to flank Tony's other side a moment later. "Let me ask you again for the third time and counting: _Who_ is it?"

"Fire-breathing."

"Beg pardon?"

"They are not 'fire-wielding', Tony Stark of Midgard." Loki said, grinning monstrously. "They are fire-breathing."

"Oh, perfect. I've always wanted to meet a dragon."

"You're the only one." Bruce interjected whilst Loki let loose a small breath of laughter. Tony decided then and there that, of all the Frost Giants he'd met so far, Loki was his favourite. But then, he'd always had a soft-spot for maniacs with a sense of humour.

"Guys, you on your way?" He asked the absent Avengers. "You're going to miss a party. Apparently there's dragons."

"Sounds more fun than the last party." Natasha replied dryly. Meanwhile, Thor replied:

"Surely you jest. Dragons will not be coerced to work with anyone but their own, and nor would they willingly wish to attack a realm as cold and barren as Jötunheim."

"I'm just reporting what I've been told, big 'n' blond. The pretty Frost Giant seems to know what he's on about."

"Pretty?" Clint asked, alongside further enquiries from Thor, but Tony didn't reply. That was mainly due to the fact they could see fire flickering in the distance, steadily creeping closer.

"Perhaps it would be prudent to retreat towards your fellow men?" Loki suggested, though his stance screamed out his lack of intent to join them.

"Na, we've got this. What's the big guy like with fire?"

Bruce smiled, shrugging. "He seemed alright with it when he obliterated New York. Twice."

"The second time was self-defence." Tony reminded him. "You were protecting the world by razing the Apple to the ground."

"I still feel bad about Harlem."

"I can assure you that your green alter-ego does not."

Something was rushing towards them fast, something which, just as the humans spotted it, looked to be a little too swift for them to defend themselves. Before either of them could even react, Loki had swung his long weapon and divorced the creature from its head.

Tony sprang from the ground, repulsors whirring to a charge, whilst Bruce took the time to startle Loki by finally hulking out.

"He's only a little dangerous." Tony called out, waving at the Hulk when the big guy glanced over, and laughing at Loki who looked delightfully put-out.

"I didn't know mortals could do that."

"Just him. I have my suit, he has his angry side."

What had attacked them had burnt black skin - like it had been _charred_. Tony noted they were bipedal, though he could see some of the creatures approaching them used their knuckles for extra speed, exactly like a gorilla. They seemed to be a little bit scrawnier than a gorilla however, as well as most Frost Giants - built more like Loki than like Helblindi. Thin and lithe.

The creepy thing about them was that, besides a mouth lined with razor-sharp teeth, there seemed to be no defining features about their faces.

"What the hell are they?"

"Golems," Loki smiled that vicious, battle-thirsty grin again. "From the brimstone of Muspelheim."

"And how do we kill them?"

"Exactly as I showed you, Tony Stark. Decapitation. Though, I imagine Bruce Banner can simply crush them."

"How about blowing them up? Will that work?"

"How, precisely, do you plan to do that?"

The golems were close now, close enough to be in range of Tony's smaller projectiles. He let off a few in demonstration. Thankfully, the golems they hit shattered and didn't get up again.

"Efficient." Loki allowed with a smile and an eyebrow raise. "Be wary of their breath."

"Fire-breathing, I remember."

Hulk took out at least five whilst they spoke, quickly dispatching another three. The golems seemed as mindless as Amora's un-dead had been, but thankfully they didn't seem to be quite so numerous. They also weren't near anywhere populated, so that was one less thing to worry about.

Their fire was also rendered useless against the Iron Man armour, and while Hulk didn't like it, it left no real damage and he was able to bound on, jumping straight into the fray to swipe them away with his large hands before they even got near Tony or Loki.

Those who had avoided the Hulk were a significantly smaller stream of stone creatures, heedlessly charging into Tony's attack range, where he blasted them with his repulsors. As an added precaution, he was still hovering safely in the air. They could jump at him, or send some fire-breath his way, but they couldn't actually touch him before Tony had blown them to pieces.

From his vantage point, he could see Loki mercilessly take heads from shoulders, stamping on blank faces when he had a spare second before stabbing the next enemy clean through.

He was at more of a risk than either of the two Avengers were - his very species making him much more vulnerable to the attacks of the Muspel golems - and Tony called out to him sharply when a golem came up behind him and open its mouth wide.

"Loki!"

But it was too late. The fire the golem produced all but obliterated Loki from Tony's view, completely encompassing the Frost Giant with its flame. Tony shot forward, flying low so to smash heads as he passed by, pointing his repulsor at the creature attacking the Jötun.

The Hulk had heard Tony's call and was there in an instant, batting the golems away like they were flies, smashing them with his fists in fury. They spared a look to Loki's position when the fire died down, just to find that there was nothing there. Beneath his mask, Tony snarled.

"God damn it!"

Hulk roared to the sky, ruthless now in his vehemence, protective as he was of even his newest of comrades.

Tony slaughtered the next golems without blinking, impassioned by the loss of the strange Jötun, who had laughed at Bruce's joke and tried to protect them by warning them away. The idiot should have spend some more time thinking about himself.

Only another few minutes went by until they both stopped, Tony heaving for breath whilst the Hulk surveyed the damage wrought. All the golems were dead, and whilst Tony had come out looking a little overcooked, the suit wasn't inwardly damaged and that was what counted.

He sat down heavily on top of one of the stone bodies, opening his face plate and basking in the heat that the rubble let off, which was so different from the endless cold they had so far experienced on this planet.

"Thanks for the help, guys." He said when he finally spotted the Avengers running towards them. "Your timing is exquisite."

They halted just short of edge of the heaping bodies of golems, Clint prodding one with his foot. "They're hot!" He called, putting his hands just short of the remains as if they were a campfire.

"What are they?" Steve asked, stepping closer and focusing on Tony more than the shattered creatures. "They don't look like they could be alive."

"And they stink." Natasha added.

"Golems." Tony answered. "They're fast brimstone that can breathe fire."

"Where is the Jötun?" Thor asked, joining Tony in perching himself on top of one, glad for the warmth.

"The one you called 'pretty'." Natasha reminded him.

"He _was_ pretty." Tony said, though the words were heavy on his tongue. He smashed his hand down on the golem he was sitting on. "They got him."

Hulk reacted as Tony had, spending a moment rendering the fallen stone creatures around him to nothing more than dust.

"Oh." Steve looked far too sad over someone he hadn't even met. "That's a shame."

"He was stupid for being here in the first place-" Tony started, but was interrupted by a smooth, clear voice. One that sounded far too amused for its own good.

" _Am_ , Tony Stark. Present tense. Though I do not appreciate my intelligence being undermined."

Tony looked up to find Loki standing in all his Jötun glory, in the midst of the golem remains Clint was warming himself up on. The archer yelped, startled by the sudden presence appearing in front of him, gracelessly tripping over some debris behind his feet.

Natasha caught his arm, whilst the Frost Giant smirked.

Tony stood quickly, fuming, pointing a finger. "I thought you were _dead_!" He cried.

"Hardly. You and Bruce Banner were faring better than expected, so I used you as a distraction to do a little reconnaissance."

"I'm going to kill you."

"I would advise against it. My apparent death beforehand seemed to upset you greatly." The bastard was smirking again, and Tony wondered how well the suit would fare against ice if he throttled him.

The Hulk make a noise which wiped the smile straight off the bastard's bright blue face, and it was only then that Loki inclined his head, looking at least a little apologetic.

"I perhaps should have warned you beforehand." He considered, and Tony huffed.

"Yeah, _maybe_. Then, perhaps, I'd have been spared the heart palpitations."

Loki smiled again lightly, before glancing around at Tony's company. His eyes immediately stopped at Thor, only just noticing him, and he stood straighter, taking a few steps towards the god.

Thor, for his part, had long since arisen from his seat - ever since Loki's impromptu arrival. He was outright staring at the Jötun in the same way Tony had upon meeting him, and in the manner the others were too. Thor glanced at his hair, at his size, before coming back to himself with a few blinks. He cleared his throat.

"Loki." He said.

"Thor." Loki returned blankly.

"It is an honour to meet you."

Loki's lips quirked. "I'm sure." His tone was somewhat embittered. "It is an honour that Völundr rómu has sent us his heir. You are said to be the mightiest of all beings."

"I believe that honour goes to Dr. Banner." Thor inclined his head to the Hulk, and Loki briefed a glance. "In return, I have heard you to be a skilled magician, far beyond the skills of any of our own."

"That is because Agardians underestimate magic as you underestimate your women. I assume Midgard do not, since they have sent a female warrior with you."

"Yeah, equality is a big thing at the moment on Earth." Tony said. "Natasha is the best of us all."

"Then it is an honour to have you choose fight alongside us, Natasha." Loki graciously said.

"Did you learn anything?" Thor asked him, referring to when the Frost Giant had slipped away from Iron Man and the Hulk during the battle to get further behind enemy lines than the Jötuns had so far managed.

"Plenty." Loki replied, eyes gleaming. "I need to report back to Yåtnir and send word to the king."

"Yåtnir was attacked this morning." Steve informed the Jötun, who only gritted his teeth and clenched his fists at the news.

"I see."

"Many have survived," Thor informed him. "The injured are being taken to the capital, whilst those willing to fight on are moving to Turmilr."

"Then that is where I shall go. Is that your heading also?"

"We've still got to find the prince." Clint said, but Natasha punched his arm lightly. Clint protested against her unprovoked treatment, asking what that was for. Natasha just tutted. Loki was smirking again.

"You know something we don't." Tony winced up at him suspiciously, eyes glancing to Thor who was looking to both him and Clint with incredulity. Then something dawned on him.

"Oh. Oh! It's _you_. Why didn't you tell us? Bruce told you earlier we were searching for you!"

"He's the crown prince?" Clint gaped, prompting Natasha to tut again. Tony didn't feel it an insult to his intelligence that she'd figure it out before him, since she was a master spy and used to putting clues together in an instant, whereas Tony was a genius engineer, who made A.I.s which shot Searle's Chinese Room argument straight out of the damn water, not a detective. What did he look like, Sherlock Holmes?

"He's a prick." Perhaps that wasn't strictly speaking appropriate to say to the heir of Jötunheim, but Loki had already heard him say worse things and had yet to be offended. Thor, on the other hand, was more than willing to be affronted for him.

"Watch how you speak, Stark." He said lowly, warningly, but Loki merely smiled.

"Your quest is complete, warriors of Midgard. Perhaps now is time to leave. I have much to tell my brother." And then he was gone. Not even a flash or a puff of smoke or a ghostly afterimage remained to suggest he'd been there at all. They'd all seen the teleportation trick before, when Amora was flitting from rooftop to rooftop, laughing her maniacal little cackle, but never so elegantly, nor so neatly. Amora had always left a little bit of magic behind, uselessly glittering for a few moments before spluttering out. Thor hadn't been exaggerating when he complimented Loki on his skills. No doubt that was how he got away from the golem without leaving Tony or the Hulk any the wiser.

"Does that mean we still have to go back on the damn wargs?" Clint groaned. "They stink worse than these things do."

"I'll race you back." Tony grinned, already in the air and shooting away. Hulk was right behind him, and Thor not far after.

"We'll see you at the camp!" They heard Steve call out, but it was a voice soon lost by the wind as they flew.

\--

Loki looked even smaller when he stood next to his brothers, and in between now and when Tony had last seen him he had gained a heavy cloak which hung over his shoulders. He was in the central building, speaking with Helblindi and writing in sharp lines over a thin piece of slate.

He looked up when he heard the bluster of the three first arrivals - so far there was no sign of Clint, Natasha or Steve, which was only obvious since the vargr were no match for the God of Thunder, Iron Man and the Hulk when they decided they wanted a race. Thor had won, but only just, though Tony had tried a few dirty tactics. Hulk had once grabbed his leg as well, playfully snatching the Asgardian straight out of the air, steaming ahead as Tony paused to chortle.

"Tony Stark." Loki immediately greeted, and then Bruce and finally Thor. The other Frost Giants were staring at Bruce and how he was now significantly larger than the majority of them, Býleistr only excluded by mere millimetres. He was eyeballing the Hulk severely, no doubt unused to not being the only burly pack-member. "Where are your companions?"

"They're on their way. We're just going to go chillax for a few moments, aren't we, big guy?" He said to the Hulk, who grunted at him in what Tony took to be acquiescence.

"I will talk to Odinson, then. He can update you and your team later."

"Sounds good." He told the crown prince, already leading Bruce's green side away to the small ice structure they'd been gifted. "Damn, I don't think you're going to fit."

A passing Frost Giant took it upon himself to use his influence over ice to alter the shape of the building to better accommodate for the Hulk's impressive size. Tony knew that the soldiers likely been told to treat the visiting warriors with the utmost respect, since they were willingly offering help without any obligation to, but it was still nice. Further, they had also just returned the crown prince back from a dangerous mission, so they deserved a little bit of special treatment. Sure, Loki proved more than capable of handling himself, but Helblindi's face when he was told Loki had set out on a scout said that _he_ at least thought otherwise. It was probably to do with Loki's size; he did look particularly frail against the rest of his race.

Bruce eventually shrank back down to human-size again, and Tony was there waiting, ready and armed with clothes and furry blankets, for when he did. Bruce was starting to be awake upon transformation now, which was a major step from before when he'd consistently pass out. It seemed like he was beginning to take a bit more control. He didn't have a habit of staying awake for long, and this time was no different, but he at least managed to blink up at Tony, accepting a shirt and pair of trousers, before huddling himself into his thick vargr skins. Tony had also since rid himself of his suit and was now wrapped up in his own blanket.

"You pansies! Can't take a little cold!" Clint immediately caterwauled as he burst in, though he was quick to dive under the covers as the adrenaline of rushing about the planet started to wear off.

"Not looking so big now, huh, Katniss?" Tony commented snidely.

"Shut up. Katniss was badass."

"And I bet _she_ could deal with cold."

"Better than you could, C3PO."

"Boys." Steve interrupted quietly, shooting a look to Bruce, but Tony wasn't worried. Bruce was dead to the world at this stage. A second golem attack wouldn't wake him now.

"You've remodelled." Natasha observed, glancing around at their expanded space.

"Found ourselves a friendly neighbourhood giant willing to expand for Mr Gamma here. A natural-born architect. Really, he's just wasted as a soldier."

Thor came in later to tell them what Loki had found. Tony didn't retain a lot of it - it seemed to be something to do with throaty noises and silly names and mystical objects and a dude named Surtur who had beef with King Laufey.

As he started to drift off despite himself, Tony made a mental note to ask whether the information gathered could tell them how to stop the war when he woke up.

\--

"Stark." A voice hissed, close to his ear. Tony tried to bat it away, because whatever it was sent a freezing draft across his face.

"Stark!" The voice sounded a little more urgent now, but it wasn't until a glacial hand touched his shoulder that Tony jerked awake.

"Shit!" He managed to hiss, before Loki pressed a finger to his own lips, indicating silence. Tony mindlessly copied the gesture before realising, prompting a smile from the Jötun.

"Don your armour." The prince said. "Meet me outside."

"That sounds like a booty call." Tony replied, but by that point the room was empty and Loki had since vacated the premises.

"God, it's cold." He muttered to himself, putting on an extra jumper as he brought the Mark V outside, conveniently packed and ready to go.

Loki was standing on the inside of the gates, and Tony met him there, donning the suit as far away from where the Avengers slept as possible, so not to wake them.

"What's up, your highness?" See, Tony _could_ remember his manners.

"Odinson told you of our foe?"

"Some fire giant named Surtur? Yeah, I got that much. Why?"

Loki's sly expression told stories.

"Whatever you're thinking, it's insane. I can tell by the unhinged look in your eye."

"You are aware I'm committing to memory every slur you utter against me so I can build up a case to have you executed?" Loki said conversationally.

"If you were really going to do that, you'd have probably just chopped my head off when I called you pretty within earshot."

"You did that twice." Loki nodded agreeably. "'Pretty' is not a particularly dignified term for a prince."

"If it makes you feel better, if you were a princess I would have called you beautiful."

"That you _didn't_ , even as I am, offends me more."

"Will I be tortured before being executed for all this?"

"I will insist on it."

"Even though I'm helping to save your people from complete eradication?"

"We don't bend the law for _anyone_ , Stark, even if you went to the capital emblazoned as a war hero."

"Oh, good. Just so we're clear."

Loki's eyes were alight with mirth, and Tony found the edges of his lips tilting upwards. Yeah, okay, he actually really kinda liked the crown prince of Jötunheim a lot.

"So, what's this mad idea of yours, psycho-eyes?"

"It involves someone more immune to fire than I - such as yourself or Banner. Either would do, but I did not believe it wise to provoke Banner's wrathful side by waking him."

"Probably a good idea. He seemed to like you, but no one is happy at being woken at whatever godawful time it is."

It was late enough that the skies were darker than usual and the stars were a little brighter. There was only minimal guards lining the walls, though no doubt the soldiers at the encampment had become well-adjusted to light sleeping. A single alarm bell would have them all armed and ready within seconds.

"Do you want an apology?"

"Will I get one?"

"I am the oldest son of Laufey." Loki said, imperiously. It was only half a joke.

"And that makes you incapable of common courtesy?"

"I'm the heir to the throne of Jötunheim. Courtesy is optional."

Loki was leading them away from the camp, nodding briefly at the guards who opened the gates for them without protest.

"I suspect we're doing some sneaky spying. You should've woken up 'Tasha. She's an assassin by trade."

Loki looked intrigued by this, before shrugging expressively. "I have not seen her skills in battle as of yet, whereas I know you are capable. I suspect the time will come where I see her talent you boast of so, but for now you shall have to do."

"You can just admit you like me, you know, and we can all move on."

"Princes do not _like_ commoners."

"Hey, in my defence I'm kinda like royalty at home. I've got money, land, shiny things, all that stuff nobility takes so seriously. The only thing I'm lacking is a title."

"Which is the only this nobility truly cares about, Stark. You could be the poorest, most wretched, disgusting of creatures, but being named a Lord or a Duke or a Count would write it off as eccentric."

"I'm already eccentric." Tony shrugged. "I'd like to be Count Stark. Very Dracula."

"You are aware you're prattling nonsense."

"Even _Cap_ would have gotten that reference." Tony complained, before considering, "Actually, you've probably not taken a trip to Earth in a while, have you?"

Loki shook his head. "I've never had chance to leave this realm, Stark."

"It's Tony." He corrected, fed up now of his newest playmate calling him by his surname; distancing them both from each other verbally. "And I _did_ realise that after I spoke. Pepper is always telling me not to speak before thinking."

"Surely you must have to think to produce words."

"That's what _I_ said," Tony gestured passionately. "She wouldn't listen to me. Something to do with shallow processing or automatic lexical and phonological frames, I don't know, I'm not a psychologist."

He stopped when he realised Loki wasn't listening to him, and that it was Tony's sudden silence which drew the man's attention.

"Are you finished with your babbling?"

"Probably not."

"Well, in this brief reprieve, we might as well leave. We are far enough from camp now."

Before Tony could ask where precisely Loki was planning on taking him, the Frost Giant had grabbed the shoulder of his suit and a surrounded them both with a spell of dazzling emerald.

"Have you ever met the Enchantress?" He asked when he stumbled from the spinning of a teleportation spell. "Or is all magic that colour?"

"No, and I cannot tell you. There are sparse few sorcerers across the nine realms, and less on this one than most. The few that are here are only low-level mages."

"If it makes you feel better Earth only has one, and his name is Stephen."

"Is that not an appropriate Migardian name for a sorcerer?" Loki deduced from his tone.

Tony would have said something out loud, had he not finally managed to stand straight and survey his surroundings. Instead, speechless, he just shook his head.

"This was where I found myself earlier this day." Loki explained, watching the blazing lands before them, and in the distance the camps - if they could be called that - of the enemy of Jötunheim. One was nothing more than a pillar of fire, rising up into the dark sky, with the soldiers - golems and other creatures alike - surrounding it.

Most concerning was an expanding circle of small but persistent flames tearing through the icy landscape, spreading closer every minute, inch by inch. Given enough time, it'd consume the planet without any attacks needed from Surtur's army.

"We're going closer, aren't we?"

"How quickly you have come to know me."

"It's actually more of a game of 'What would Tony Stark do?' than any inductive method."

"And Tony Stark would recklessly go on a fool's errand leading only into the arms of death itself?"

"It's a bad habit of mine."

"Is that so?" Loki glanced him over once, before nodding. "All the better I chose you to accompany me on this task, then. Fate seems to be playing into my hands today."

"Fate's been sending me mixed messages recently," Tony replied, but followed the Jötun as he set out on light feet.

The path ahead of them was dangerous, slippery with melting ice that concerned them both in varying degrees. Loki was worried for his planet, what the ever-eating fire would eventually do to their chances of winning which were already too low to consider any real victory. Tony was more worried about falling on his armoured behind.

"So, what's the plan?"

"Get close enough to see their numbers."

"Or," Tony said consideringly, the newest direction of thought motivated by his want to get off the treacherous ground. "High enough."

Loki had yet to see him fly properly. Tony grinned.

\--

They couldn't even be seen as they flew miles above them, trying to look down upon the fiery armies like ants. It was safer up here, even with all the smoke, because it was far away from the fires which would cause untold damage to _Tony_ , never mind Loki.

Loki himself was faring badly enough as it was, the air sizzling and black and impossible to see through. Tony was fine in his armour, and had JARVIS scan the surface of the planet on overtime so they could at least measure what was going on and the numbers they were potentially facing, but he had no form of protection to offer the Frost Giant.

Loki was sitting on his back in a very graceless position - for Tony at least. He was glad for the dense smoke clouds, else someone might have seen them in such a ridiculous state. Loki didn't care, but then Loki was doing the riding and not playing the pack-mule.

"This was not your brightest idea, Tony."

"Better than yours. I'd prefer to choke on carbon monoxide than burn alive, thank you."

"Which would be a well-made point should it not also be true that 'tis I doing the choking."

"You're a thousand-year-old Jötun. I'm a puny, weak, 40-year-old mortal. You're tougher than I am."

"Being over a thousand years does _not_ endow me with the power to see everything, such as through his fog. This endeavour is useless and we should try going from the ground."

"Just bibbity-bobbity-boo the smoke away or something."

"I truly do not understand Midgardian turn of phrase. I have come to believe you are all either extremely intelligent or blubbering idiots. Which is it?"

"A little bit of both, I think." Then Tony spotted something through the haze - a bright light of reds and oranges, inching closer every second. From the way Tony felt Loki's weight redistribute across his back, Loki had seen it too and was preparing himself for the worst, weapon in hand and ready.

"JARVIS, what is it?"

JARVIS was three steps ahead of him, already bleeping results in his face, showing a heat source unlike anything Tony had ever experienced before.  

"Am I looking at an erupting volcano?" Tony asked, but it was Loki who dismissed his hypothesis.

"You'll desire it was, Tony."

And, approaching it and being able to see as the smoke finally started to clear, Tony _definitely_ wished it had been.

"Shit."

"Aptly put." Loki replied.


	2. Chapter 2

"What the hell is that?" He said as they made a sharp turn to keep the hell away from their discovery.

"I believe," Loki said, stretching his body across Tony's back to make them smaller, and so Tony's sensors would pick up Loki's whispers. "That is our foe."

If Tony had thought Býleistr was big, he was nothing compared to the monster looming before them. Making steady progress across the wintery lands of Jötunheim, the scene depicted was closer to the fiery pits of hell than what should have been snowy deserts. Surtur, Tony noticed absently, wasn't touching any of the ice, but it was a comment left unsaid; a thought loss among more immediate concerns of his gigantic size and legions of golems and flaming soldiers flooding by his feet.

"That's disheartening." Tony commented mildly, and Loki hummed in agreement, attention mostly absent as he took in the scene before him.

"What do we know about him?" Tony asked, taking them higher and starting on a distant and wide circle. They needn't get nearer, since Surtur's size made it hard to lose him. JARVIS was trying his best to understand the creature, but as Jötuns had a body temperature low enough to inflict immediate frost bite, the natives of Muspelheim had the exact opposite and JARVIS, as a sensible artificial intelligence, did not like that one bit. Tony was impressed at himself and his suit for surviving as well as it had against the golems before, since they could just about melt the skin from the bone.

"I know nothing more than he is their king." Loki uselessly confided, and Tony tutted.

"I assume that means you've got no idea how to stop him."

"I have been informed he is immortal."

"Isn't that dandy."

They did another loop of the area, assessing the numbers and the direction the Fire Giants were headed. It was, it seemed, in the opposite direction of the camp.

"Where are they going?"

"I am unsure. There are not even settlements this far north." Loki said, confused. "What are they looking for?"

The soldiers were melting all ice they could find, clearly on the hunt, though for what was unclear. What would there be hidden in the frozen mountains of this empty realm?

"I wonder-" Loki began, and Tony briefed a glance over his shoulder just to catch the expression on the Jötun's face.

"No, stop with the thinking thing-" But it was already too late. Loki had managed, even deep within the suffocating rising heat, to summon up a great spear of ice, and had sat up to correctly aim. Loki let go of the spear before Tony had completely managed to comprehend what the prince was doing, and after he could only watch in mounting horror as the weapon sailed though the air and firmly pierced the skin of Surtur's scapula.

The reaction was immediate. Though it only looked as if nothing more than a tooth-pick had managed to hit him, Loki obviously had charmed it in some way, as the ice spread thick across Surtur's shoulder, cooling the red skin that looked as if fires flickered merrily beneath. The cold extinguished them as it snaked over his body, and instantly it seemed as if the giant lost use of the affected arm.

"Move." Loki hissed, lying low again, and Tony was off in a shot, catching the movement of the fire giant spinning around, scanning the skies for his attacker.

Keen black eyes spotted Tony's suit with frightful ease, and Surtur swung a hand to knock them from their path. The suit fell backwards, unable to dodge, and Loki dug his hands into Tony's chest plate as they hurtled from the sky.

"Tony!" He yelled, but Tony couldn't get the suit to cooperate. The force of the impact, and the heat, had just about fried the main functions. He could only see the sky as they spun in a downwards spiral.

"JARVIS?" He tried, but the AI was flickering and choppy, trying with all his might, Tony knew, but it just wasn't good enough.

And then the world became hazy with green, before they landed heavily on the ground.

Tony took a moment to marvel that he wasn't dead, before realising that they had hit something a little bit softer than what he'd expected. A glance down had him blinking at the snow, and then smiling at Loki's teleportation.

Speaking of the devil, Tony heard a groan in the tones of the Jötun prince from beneath the suit. In a panic and a singular great burst of strength, Tony rolled away from his landing point, where Loki had been caught beneath him.

"You broke my fall," he said, a touch hysterically, as he looked over to see the blue alien struggling for breath.

"You broke my ribs." Loki returned, hands travelling over his chest, before green sparks swirled over his body, fixing whatever was wrong.

"Neat trick, magic fingers." Tony allowed, wondering whether it'd work on his suit as he tried to manually wrench the face plate open. It'd save him hours in repair-work. Loki laid his head back in the snow when he was finished and started to laugh.

"You're a psycho." Tony informed him.

"And what does that make you, the man so willing to follow me into danger?"

"An idiot."

Loki smiled at him delightfully, watching him as he struggled in the suit. He stood and stretched out a hand and used his superior strength to simply snap the visor off.

"That works." Tony stated as Loki dropped it in the snow. "Now I've got to fix that."

"Do be quiet, Stark." Loki said, jerking him up from his impression in the snow and pressing him into an ice-cold wall.

What happened next was not Tony's fault.

\--

Loki kissed Tony. Just to specify that it wasn't the other way round, Loki kissed Tony. Tony did not force himself on the crown prince of Jötunheim and he wished to make that absolutely clear to anyone calling for his immediate arrest.

Sure, he reacted, but Tony figured who wouldn't when Loki had him pushed up against a glacier, licking his tongue into Tony's mouth. He was cold, he was forceful, he was pretty, and they had just survived an intense, if brief, encounter with Surtur himself, the king of the Fire Giants. Tony was feeling good, high on the adrenaline, and Loki was taking it upon himself to act on his own. So, yeah, he kissed back.

"You burn me," Loki hissed against his lips, and Tony clung onto him tighter, drawing him closer, wanting so much more as Loki complied to his touch.

Tony had been in and out of relationships these past few years since the Avengers formed and Pepper and he parted ways, but none were more than a few nights long; unfounded in anything but lust. He'd mostly fallen back into his old playboy, one-night-stand routine that still made Pepper tut despite the fact it was now none of her damn business and JARVIS was starting to make increasingly snide comments. He'd ignored them, like he'd ignored Rhodey and Clint when they also joined in with the sarcastic innuendo squad.

It wasn't until a series of shouts from the distance drew them apart that Tony realised he was shaking. Without the suit's internal artificial environment, and then being stuck between a Jötun and a cold place, he was numb in most areas of his body. This was what Cap must have felt like when he'd been thawing out of his seventy-year snooze.

Loki found humour in the situation, realising what had happened and not looking the least bit apologetic. He, himself, appeared more flushed than usual, skin a little less than biting to the touch, damp with perspiration. Whilst Tony would like to brag, he knew it wasn't solely heat from arousal.

"Looking a little hot under the collar, your highness." Tony pointed out, glancing out to the distance to where a group of Frost Giants and Cap and Widow were running up to greet them.

Loki just snorted, only just finding time to get out a snide remark before having to greet his brother's soldiers, regal façade firmly back in place.

"I fear you're becoming ill, Tony. Your lips look frightfully discoloured."

"Yeah, no thanks to you."

It was also the first thing Cap noticed when he confronted Tony with a thankful hug.

"We were scared! You're so cold! Are your lips blue?"

"Probably."

"We'll get you a fire going."

"Whoa, no!" Tony said adamantly, instantly recalling the last fire he was near. He did not want to experience that again anytime soon. "No fire. Give me a blanket and I'll cuddle up to Bruce. All that gamma radiation must have superheated him or something. That man is a walking sauna."

"What happened?" Natasha asked, looking between the busted-up Iron Man and the prim and perfect prince of Jötunheim, who looked no worse for wear than before they'd left the camp.

"Surtur." Loki replied, capturing all undivided attention. "We must return immediately."

"Yeah, no dilly-dallying whatsoever. No distractions. We've got urgent news to impart." Tony nodded and Loki gave him a stern look.

"I do wish you'd find a way to silence your comrade, Captain Rogers, else he might find himself in dire trouble with that ceaseless wagging tongue."

"It also comes in handy with getting me out of trouble." Tony grinned.

"Not if you don't have one any longer, Mr. Stark."

"I'll start being intimidated when you start acting on your threats."

"Is that a challenge?"

"We should get back to camp." Steve interrupted before Tony could reply, clearly concerned for the continued well-being of his teammate. It seemed that Steve didn't recognise the playful tone Loki had adopted, which, admittedly, sounded a hell of a lot like his serious voice, but, from the curious glace Natasha sent over to Tony, she at least had been able to distinguish the two. Tony dismissed her prying eye, and beckoned Steve over.

"Gotta give me some help here, Cap. I'm both freezing and frying and I really don't remember how to function."

Two very cold points of contact touched the inventor's forehead, and Tony realised Loki had prodded him in the face. He would have complained had a shudder of warmth not shot straight down his spine and through each limb, making him tingle deliciously.

"You couldn't have done that before?" He snapped, but Loki was already walking away, camp-bound.

"How did you find us?" He asked his teammates, leaning on them both to distribute the weight of the suit to somewhere that wasn't his shoulders alone.

"All magicians leaves traces, apparently, even someone as skilled as Loki." Natasha answered promptly. "We've been keeping an eye the area, so when you arrived we knew where to look."

"Awesome." Tony accepted. "Now, how much trouble are we in?"

Steve grimaced, whilst Natasha chuckled prettily.

Oh. That much.

\--

Helblindi was livid - completely beside himself with rage. He didn't even wait until Loki had joined him at the central hut before yelling, and instead met the group half-way through the base.

"Where were you? You cannot just disappear like that, Loki!"

Loki glared heatedly at this treatment, rolling his eyes patronisingly. "I apologise, brother, but are you the king now? Surely you must be, else you wouldn't be telling me what I can and can't do."

"This is no place for jokes! I'm not sure whether you have noticed but we are in the middle of a war." Helblindi roared. "We do not have time for your tricks and games and petty whims!"

"I found Surtur!" Loki snarled in reply, "And I know of how to defeat him! Yet you name that a petty whim?"

"You went off on your own! And no, that mortal does not count! What can a singular mortal do?"

"He is the reason we got as far as we did." Loki said lowly, the look in his eye more dangerous than any of Helblindi's blustering could ever hope to be. "I am not a child, brother, and you will do well to recall that I am the oldest of our father's sons. I am the crown prince, I am the future king of this land, and I am the most powerful sorcerer these realms have ever known. I am not helpless, I am not crippled, I am not at risk due to my stature. You may see me as weak, but I could take you apart without so much as touching you." Loki held up a hand, forcing both his brothers to their knees and even forcibly silencing Helblindi as he went to protest.

The princes were soon willingly followed to the floor by the entourage of spectators staring in shock at the display. The aliens were soon the only ones left standing, Tony watching Loki with surprise and fascination, before Steve nudged at him to at least lower his head. Tony swooped down into an impressive half-bow, helped along by the weight of his suit, keeping his eyes locked on the slender Jötun throughout. Loki's face was a serious frown focused exclusively on his siblings, slighted at being underestimated and treated as fragile, but he did not seem angry. That was at least something. The last thing anyone needed was a fight between the heirs of Laufey on top of the war against Muspelheim.

"Now," he said sternly, looking down, for once, at his younger brother. "Are you quite prepared to listen to me?"

Stiffly, Helblindi nodded, and the two heirs felt their brother's spell release them. They struggled to their feet, glancing around at their subjects who were still complacently kneeling in the snow. Both of them looked put-out, mortified at being forced to the same level as the common man. Loki had since turned smartly on his heel and made a bee-line for Helblindi's hut, and, with a glare to the Avengers who were all staring, the second son of Laufey followed. Býleistr at least beckoned them after as he trailed miserably along.

"What is it you must say?" Helblindi immediately barked, as Loki poured himself over a map, sketching out where he and Tony had found Surtur, and in which direction the giant was seen heading.

"Ice and cold has as severe an effect on him as his monsters do us. One arm was rendered almost useless as soon as I hit it with magic."

"Which would be wonderful, if he wasn't safely behind his packs of golems who're setting fire to everything." Tony elaborated. "It's going to be dangerous for any of you guys to get to him."

"The Iron Man is correct. But Surtur is not directing his battalions towards us. What we have experienced is nothing more than the Fire Giant's spare forces. A distraction, if you will. Miniscule and pathetic comparative to the actual armies he directs."

"Why isn't he attacking with them, then?" Helblindi asked. "And wipe us all out at once."

"He's searching for something and needs all eyes assisting him."

"Which is funny, because the golems don't have eyes." Steve elbowed Tony in the gut.

"What does he expect to find?" Helblindi questioned, ignoring the human.

Loki didn't know, and Tony just shrugged. "Whatever it is, he's looking for it in this vicinity." The inventor waved a gauntlet over the areas of the map Loki had marked out.

"What's out there?" The crown prince asked his younger brothers, but both shook their heads.

"No one and nothing, as far as we are aware. Perhaps it is something lost from the era before the war. We should ask father."

"There is no need," Thor interrupted, staring down at the various illustrated landscapes on the map with a surprising amount of studiousness. "I believe I know."

Loki's eyes narrowed in suspicion. "What do you know of our lands, Odinson?" He spat out the All-Father's name like a curse, inferring something from the Asgardian's tenor that the others were blind to.

"Nothing, bar the tales of my father. He once faced Surtur, many years ago, and almost lost to the might of the Fire Giant, who, at the time, wielded a sword, which my father rid him of and hid somewhere on a different realm. I believe that is what they wish to discover. The weapon goes by the name of the Sword of Doom."

"So I'm going to go out on a limb here," Clint said into the tense atmosphere. "And say that letting Surtur get his hands on this sword again would be bad."

"To put it lightly." Thor allowed. "The power that this sword can unleash is something even my father had difficulty defeating. It previously almost laid ruin to Asgard, which is much more resistant to the flames than," he stopped to look around at the pure white landscape, glittering dully in the dim light. Cold and ice and snow and frost as far as the eye could see. "Than here."

"We need to stop him." Býleistr snapped.

"How?" Helblindi barked, already in a bad enough mood to start with without all this nonsense. "We are not strong enough to so much as reach him. To defeat even the golems with the force we have now we'd need something equally as powerful as this Sword of Doom."

Loki stiffened, and as he was in the centre of the gathering it drew immediate attention. Helblindi caught on quicker than the rest of the assembled company and snorted archly.

"You are a fool to think such things, brother."

"And you the fool to give up as swiftly as you have just done." Loki returned snippily, before turning to Thor with a stormy expression, cutting straight to the chase. "I need to meet with the Masked One. We need the Casket of Ancient Winters."

Immediately, without even a hint of consideration, Thor shook his great blond head in refusal. He did at least look regretful for denying them this chance.

"What?" Captain America called out, astonished. "Why? This may be their only hope!"

"My father will not allow the Casket to return to this world. It was in the agreement of ceasefire of the last great war between Asgard and Jötunheim, and the only thing securing the peace between the two realms."

Býleistr snarled, "You think we animals? We are only as ruthless as you yourselves are, noble Æsir. The casket was the heart of this land, and that your father took it from us is the reason we are in this situation to begin with! He has condemned us to die, and now you do the same!"

"Brother," Loki commanded Býleistr to silence calmly into the room, eyes trained on the hulking blond. "You must listen to me very carefully, Thor of Asgard, son of Odin and Frigga, and you must consider my words. When your father faced mine our numbers were triple than how we began this war, do you understand? We were three times the strength of now or more, and yet we still lost. Now, we are weak, we are unrecovered, and we are facing a foe we cannot hope to defeat. There are too few of us, and we will be wiped out altogether should you not hand us the means to defeat Surtur now."

Thor glances around the room, from the desperate, furious Frost Giants who are losing so much simply by asking for this boon, and then to the Avengers who were shocked by Thor's instantaneous refusal. Indecision played upon the blond's expression, showing the loyalty for his father pushing against his wish to help these people survive, and both seemed to tug equally at either end of his conscious.

"Show him your back, Býleistr." Helblindi suddenly snapped, and Thor's eyes flew to the erratic, discoloured markings which stood out in stark contrast against the Frost Giant's blue skin as he turned. There, crawling down the entirety of the Jötun's vast expanse of skin, was a navy-blue Lichtenburg figure which could have only been caused by one thing.

"Surely you recall your last visit to this planet, little prince?" Helblindi continued, meeting the stricken look that crossed Thor's face with a nasty smile. "You single-handedly caused the death of almost fifty of our kind, did you know? Your four friends cost us another seventy, at least. We are still unsure how many exactly we lost that day in the destruction you wreaked. My most fortunate brother received a souvenir to remember you by."

"I was wrong that day to lash out as I did." Thor tried to defend himself. "Amora had deceived us, and I believed you at fault. I realise the error I made when I wrongfully presumed the Frost Giants were to blame. I was arrogant, self-centred, consumed by the tales I'd been told-"

"It isn't good enough." Helblindi snarled, crowding Thor's space with his threatening height, staring the Áss down, blood red to electric blue. "We were prepared to overlook your wrongdoings when you arrived here on our invitation; to view your assistance now as a display of repentance for your previous wrongs, but we were obviously incorrect. We will hold you accountable for the loss of this war, Thor Odinson, and you shall mark me by it."

"Enough." Loki interrupted, putting a hand on his brother's chest and drawing the two away from each other firmly. "All I ask is audience, Thor." He then said carefully.

Another glance around, this time solely to view his team's reactions, Thor looked wretched as he spoke, "I cannot grant you audience with my father."

"Well, then, you shall have audience with mine. I'm sure he'll be delighted to meet our executioner."

This made the god run an anxious hand through his hair, looking more upset than the Avengers had ever seen him before. It was not a reaction regarding the threat of meeting Laufey, but rather the incensed but defeated tone of voice Loki had since adopted.

"No Frost Giant has ever entered the gates of Asgard." He eventually spoke into the tense silence.

"Perhaps it would be prudent to forewarn them, then." Loki returned. "Since I shall be the first."

\--

Heimdall wasn't the happiest of chappies.

Tony didn't know whether that was his natural disposition, or whether he reserved it just for when strangers came poking around the realm he'd 'sworn to protect', as he kept reminding them, but every time Tony had visited (twice now and counting) he was armed with his stern face and overly large sword. Seriously, how was that thing even practical?

This time, instead of giving the evil eye to Tony and Clint, it was all reserved for Loki, who positively glowed with the attention. He immediately assumed the most haughty, puffed-up expression he could muster and directed it towards the god who loomed high above them.

It worked like a charm to rile Heimdall up - Loki hadn't been in his presence for five minutes, and the man was already twitching to utilise his phallic symbol for something violent and bloody.

It might have been to do with his new look, which Tony must admit was a stunner, that made his expression seem even more hoity-toity. He now had Natasha's creamy skin in place of his usual pale blue, whilst his clothing was modest, dark and echoing Thor's own in the stylised Viking theme the Asgardians loved so much, off-setting the pale skin. His hair was the same colour as before, at least, but his eyes, before the shade of rubies, were now a toxic green. The exact same as Bruce's skin colour when his blood pressure got a little high, Tony noticed.

"Where's my influence?" He'd had asked before they had been transported through the Bifrost, prodding at Loki's sides and face with no respect for status and social standing. Loki snorted, batting his hand away.

"Why would I wish to be associated with you, Stark?" He had returned with a surprisingly patient eye-roll.

The three Avengers accompanying him to Asgard included Thor, obviously, but besides him, only Tony and Clint had come along for the ride. This wasn't for any diplomatic advantage, as if it was the archer and the inventor were the last two people you wanted on your team, but simply because they couldn't be trusted on their own in Jötunheim. Tony wouldn't hold his tongue, and Clint was starting to get it in his mind that he needed some target practise. Left unchecked, they'd be slaughtered by the irate locals before their friends got home.

Though Odin was expecting them, Loki had to be put in his new disguise so not to startle the less welcoming inhabitants. As they stepped out of the dome at the end of the Bifrost (this part, at least, being a literal rainbow bridge) it was clear why such precautions had been insisted upon. There was a decent journey ahead of them, and they had to pass through a large portion of the city before they made it to the grand palace, which stretched up towards the heavens, rising up against the grand landscape like the tower of Babel.

Loki, Tony noticed, was mesmerized. Tony didn't know what the cities were like in Jötunheim, having yet to get there, but from what he had gathered, due to the diminished populous, many of them had been abandoned and left to ruin. Likely, the buildings would be made out of ice, and they were probably magnificent, but without the sun they couldn't glitter like the golden heights of Asgard did, and without the Casket - what Tony had since learnt had been the ultimate power behind the Jötun race - their spires would never reach the glory they once held.

Loki had only been a baby when the war between Asgard and his home realm was raging, so likely the misery and darkness and cold of Jötunheim now was all he had ever known.

Coming here, therefore, was a brave, bright new world, and the camouflaged Jötun looked wondrous enough to make even stern Heimdall briefly falter.

"It's beautiful." He allowed, and Thor grinned proudly, nodding towards his homeland.

"Thank you, and welcome to Asgard, Prince Loki of Jötunheim."

"Bet that was never something you'd thought you'd say." Clint pointed out; a comment which was promptly ignored by the god of thunder.

All but Iron Man, recently fixed up by a bit of tinkering and some spare parts brought along kindly by the brilliant foresight of Dr. Bruce Banner who was known as a genius for many different reasons, clambered on the horses waiting for them outside of Heimdall's dome. They were stopped from departing by a dark hand catching Loki's wrist.

"Mark me, Laufeyson," The all-seeing Áss said lowly. "Should there be any trickery in this venture I will personally see it that you rue the day you betrayed our trust."

"Heimdall," Thor snapped, angry and dangerous, but the other god ignored him as Loki was leaning closer.

"You see everything, All-seer, and yet you do not realise that there is trickery in all things? Deceit is writ into the very core of the universe. We lie, we cheat, and we swindle every step of our lives away from someone else. I advise, therefore, that the last thing you should do is expect me to honour your trust."

"I will be watching you closely, Laufeyson."

"I hope you enjoy what you see." Loki spat out, backing away and coming to rest in between Clint and Thor. "Ride on, Odinson."

The ride through Asgard was glorious, if only due to the architecture. Surrounding them were floating fortresses, golden turrets, endless monuments that reached high to the blue and purple sky. Loki seemed lost by it, transfixed and gaping, and even Tony took a moment to be amazed by what he saw, flying higher to see the city more completely. Beyond that, it was an uneventful journey, as no one graced them with second glances (thankfully), save being met at the end of it by the king and queen of Asgard themselves, waiting serenely at the entrance to the palace.

Thor met his mother with a kiss, and his father with a nod. Odin's eye, however, was trained on the new visitor who was courteously bowing to the All-Father and his wife.

"Thank you for seeing me." He spoke, and it was only then that Odin reacted.

"We must speak inside, for fear of wandering eyes and ears."

They convened inside a grand hall which wasn't the one the Avengers were met with. That had been something else; a room on a scale none of the humans had ever before imagined, filled to the brim with thousands of natives, and for all Earth's mightiest heroes knew, it could have been the entirety of Asgard coming to greet them.

Though this one was magnificent, it did not hold the same splendour. It was clearly only used for the more discreet of meetings, such as planning to negotiate with the representative of Jötunheim for the first time in over a thousand years.

"You wish for the return of the Casket to Jötun hands." Odin said as soon as he reached his throne, perched high upon a pedestal, glittering and important and intimidating. Confronted by such a display of wealth and power, Loki didn't even blink. Perhaps he was nervous, as the outcome of this meeting would determine the continued survival of his people, but the prince wasn't about to show it.

"We must thank you for all the kindness shown to us, Odin All-Father," Loki stated carefully, a lie but masked expertly. "In the gift of your son fighting for our cause. Though I know he will prove to be of great assistance to us, it is simply not enough. The Casket of Ancient Winters is our only chance to win this war."

Odin studied the humble prince seriously, his focus laser-like and discomforting, though Loki bore it well. He was controlled enough that he didn't so much as frown when Odin stated, "No."

The word was left ringing heavy into the shining rafters for a long minute. It was the three accompanying the Jötun and not the crown prince who loudly protested.

"How much damage can he really do?" Tony called out in between Clint's finest selection of Earth's most colourful slang, and Thor's pleading for his father to consider Jötunheim's tentative position. Tony was the one Odin apparently heard, and the intimidating glare turned to the Iron Man. For a man used to being the brunt of the ire of one-eyed men, it was strange how put-out Tony felt being thrust into the limelight.

"To us? Relatively little, perhaps, but my concern cannot be solely for the people of Asgard." The god scowled, looking down upon Tony with such derision the human wished for the ground to open up and swallow him whole. He didn't like feeling so small when he was used to being on top of the world. "I must also worry about ignorant, feeble men such as you who so blindly trust those who'd sooner betray you and spit upon your remains. What would happen, Man of Iron, should this Frost Giant take the heart of his realm, the ultimate weapon of the ice they draw their power from, and turn it upon your kind? Would you be able to survive an age of cold after your planet has been turned into a replica of theirs?"

"We would not be capable of such an attack!" Loki suddenly cut across Odin's words, derailing the god completely. "We are too few to control even small attacks from Surtur's cast-offs, never mind a bid to overthrow an entire realm."

 _You think so little of us?_ went unsaid, because, yes, Odin did. Odin was still sore over the last war, as all the gods on Asgard seemed to be. Even Thor, so mighty and noble, only recently had his severe attitude change, if Býleistr's scarred back was anything to go by.

 _I would never betray this trust_ was also a sentiment left unspoken, since Loki had already told Heimdall not to trust him, and even if Loki pinky-swore that he'd be good that didn't mean any of his family could be held to the same. If not Helblindi, who was growing increasingly agitated and rightfully terrified, then it would Laufey to break that promise, as he would likely rather die than let the Casket go a second time.

Instead, Loki tried: "Have you not done enough damage to my people?"

It was perhaps the worst thing to say, but also the most honest. It threw Odin for a moment, if only because he'd never before heard such a sentiment. It was always, 'the Jötuns brought it on themselves', or 'they were the ones who wreaked the damage', and never, 'the Jötuns will never recover from this loss, and it is your fault, Odin All-Father'. Loki was the first to do and say many things.

"What can we do to anyone, even with the Casket?" Loki reiterated, the same as he had with Thor on Jötunheim. "Even if we did not return it, we wouldn't survive the might of Asgard storming in, armed and healthy, with intent on destroying us all. We are the opposite of armed and healthy."

Odin smashed the end of his spear to the ground, the echo resonating unpleasantly in the hall, demanding quiet from every soul in the wielder's presence. Loki obediently did as commanded, though not without a contemptuous glare to complete it.

"No." Odin said into the silence, a harsh wisp of breath, but no less authoritative for the volume of it. It was a diktat wrapped in a syllable, and the crown prince of Jötunheim held no power to argue against it. Shaking with fury, teeth grit with the force of his resentment, Loki still knew when it was time to stop arguing. He could not win here, when continued dispute could so quickly end in blood; not in the halls of the man who led to the defeat of Loki's kind. He was one soul, against the ancient might of gods.

The Jötun glanced briefly to the silent but looming figure of Queen Frigga, before turning back to Odin and nodding to them both. It was a short, sharp gesture, and one which spoke of his disapproval with extreme eloquence. After which he turned gracefully, pale and elegant in his disguise, and went to leave the hall.

Like sheep, Clint and Tony stormed after the Frost Giant, each clinging to their anger equally as forcefully as Loki seethed, because the men and women of this land were petty and stubborn and foolish to ignore those who need the help only they could provide. Even with consideration to the sins of the past, the Æsir didn't have the right to dismiss the call when those weaker than they were begged for help.

"Wait, Loki of Jötunheim." Odin called out into the echoing chasm, and Loki, despite himself, stopped and looked back. "You are not like your father."

The prince smirked, cold and distant, at the king of Asgard. "Oh, no. I am most certainly my mother's son."

They could hear Thor's heavy footfall as they finally reached the doors of the hall. The prince had taken a detour up to the top of the platform to speak with his father, and his stage whisper was not muffled by the reverberation of the walls.

"I had thought better of you, father."

And if the ever-loving Thor was disappointed in you, Tony considered, now was the time to re-evaluate your life choices.

\--

They were met at the camps by a sudden surplus of Jötuns, all swarming together, trying to make room in the restrictive encampment for their additional company.

By Helblindi and Býleistr, sitting on a magnificent throne of ice, sat a slight but tall Frost Giant, with a thin face and a carefully blank expression. One, Tony noticed, he'd seen echoed before on Loki's most cautious of fronts. He'd seen it when they'd watched the golems appear for the first time, or when they spied Surtur, or when they met Odin. The Jötun sitting afore them now could therefore only be King Laufey of Jötunheim.

Loki immediately sank into a bow, but his eyes remained trained on his father's figure.

Laufey stood, slowly and gracefully, as Loki returned to an upright position. He watched his son expectantly, right up until Loki shook his head without a single word to accompany it. Then Laufey's hand slammed down upon Helblindi's table and split it straight in two.

"You are reckless!" He called out, his voice gravel and glass shards like the tone of his third son. Loki looked away petulantly. "You are foolish to go to Asgard alone. They could have slain you where you stood!"

"I stand before you now, with nary a scratch to show for my troubles. They were blinded by a mere disguise." Loki sighed heavily, before continuing. "I tried to reason with them, but they gave me nothing."

"What do you expect from the Corpse-Father?" Laufey spat.

"I had to try."

"Now what, child? What's your next brilliant plan?"

Tony could only describe Loki as someone who deflated spectacularly. The posture he held when battling fire demons, or confronting the one his kind so affectionately knew as 'Lord of the Hanged' utterly abandoned him. His shoulders dropped, making his entire form seem more compact, smaller, frailer. He glanced to the floor, struggling to meet his father's red eyes, choking himself in the deliverance of the admittance that he did not have another idea.

He couldn't do it. Not in front of his family, not in front of his peers, and certainly not in front of the Frost Giants who he'd one day call subjects.

"Father," he said instead, but Laufey shook his head. Loki bit his tongue immediately, watching with clenched fists as the king turned his back, heading back inside the hut. Helblindi blindly went after their father as a glare from Býleistr dispersed the crowd, including the added men which Laufey brought with him. They, Tony noted, were older, harder, with more pale scars standing stark against their skin than many of the previous soldiers combined. They were also trying to hide their smirking faces. Tony wondered how far one of them would have to go before Loki could call for their heads as an apology, even if they were old mates of Laufey's way back from the war with Asgard.

The youngest son spent a moment staring at his oldest brother, before lightly, ever so carefully, reaching out to place a colossal hand over Loki's slender shoulder. The crown prince looked seconds away from shoving away the compassionate display, but he restricted himself to only shooting an unfounded glower towards his sibling.

Býleistr did not linger before moving to join Helblindi and Laufey, but he did manage to slip in a few words before he left.

"He was scared for you, brother."

Loki replied, "I know." before speaking no more.

The Avengers, now regrouped and sticking around to watch the whole debacle, were the only ones left overtly eying the smallest Jötun. He hadn't even shed himself of the pale skin he'd donned for Asgard yet, looking for all his worth as much an alien as they were, with an expression to match. The restrained but no less wounded face was the reason behind Tony's wandering hand which took hold of Loki's wrist and pulled him along with them.

Loki looked up, and Tony distracted him by lifting the prince's hand up to be level with the human inventor's eyes.

"You're warm." He said, which worked a charm at redirecting Loki's attention. "I mean, you're still freezing, and if you were a human we'd be on a bee-line to the hospital, but you're less frozen than usual."

"I feel colder." Loki confided. "Not much, but enough to notice the chill."

"A result of your disguise, I have little doubt." Thor nodded, strolling along behind them. "Perhaps it offers some kind of adaptation to the appropriate heat of the modelled skin."

"You've gotta let me do some scans." Tony gawked, studying the long, creamy fingers before moving to his face.

"Magic, man." Clint shook his head, shoving through them to get to their own private room and the furs awaiting him. Loki spotted their destination and furrowed his eyebrows, stopping short and almost making Thor and Steve crash straight into his back.

"You're welcome with us, Loki," Steve read into his stance, and the Avengers all quickly vocally agree. There was really no better way to make someone alienated from their own kind feel better than making them feel even more distant, after all. Loki didn't look offended by their insistence, however.

"Come on. We have food, some drink, and we can ignore the fact we're all going to die for a night, okay?" Tony prompted, and Loki watched him silently, eyes darting to them all, from the eternally blank-faced Black Widow to the earnest Captain America, before finally sighing with resounding, if slightly exaggerated, grouchiness.

"If it pleases you." He complied, as Tony tugged him inside the hut.

\--

Tony opened his eyes to see red, as Loki, once more painted blue and freezing, loomed over him in the dead of night. Again.

"We really should stop meeting like this."

Loki smiled slowly down at him, before getting up and leaving the building. Tony met him outside not a minute later.

"What stupid plan are you thinking this time?"

"I simply need a lift." Loki defended as the Mark V assembled neatly, if slightly jerkily, around Tony's body.

"You're a teleporter." He snapped the face plate back open to properly appreciate the image of an heir apparent shrugging heavily.

"Yes," he admitted. "My problem lies in that they can sense the magic and drag me back. I need to be far enough away for them to take too long to trace it to the exact location."

"They can do that?"

"Armed with a summoning spell, certainly. Even the most petty of mages can, assuring they have my trace, know my visage and name, and are standing at the precise place I left. Helblindi, for example. Mediocre magician he may be, but his sigils are only second to mine. Up."

"And that will help, how?" Tony questioned as Loki clambered onto his back and they shot off into the stiff night air.

"The further away we lead him, the longer I have to complete my mission."

"And how far out are we going?"

"Miles, if you can."

Tony laughed from inside his suit, picking up the speed with that hint of a challenge. "You ain't seen nothing yet, princess."

"I do wish you'd restrain yourself from insulting my person. I have no wish to see you executed."

"That's sweet."

"I would still persist until you were, of course, but I would be mildly disappointed to see your head on a pike."

Tony snorted. "No, you wouldn't. You'd freeze it and keep it in your bedroom as a hat-stand."

Loki smiled, not bothering to deny it. "Undoubtedly."

They were closer to where Tony originally arrived on the planet than they were to the camp when Loki instructed Tony to land. Around them was a whole jolly load of nothing, but they didn't dare go farther, as the fire was starting to creep over the horizon.

"Won't be long until it gets to Turmilr." Tony and Loki took a minute they should spare to watch as it burnt its way nearer. "We're too close to where they are."

"Are you a warrior or a coward, Tony?" Loki turned away, walking a few paces and assessing his surroundings.

"Depends on the day. Are you about to teleport behind enemy lines? Because that is a bad idea."

"No. Well, yes. A different enemy." Loki dismissed his questioning blithely. "I'm only crossing over to the side of the Muspel Giants briefly, before disappearing from this realm altogether."

"I thought you needed the Bifrost to change realms." Thor had been very clear on the complexities of inter-realm travel, and how much energy is needed to send even one person across planets without using the Bifrost. Enough, the prince had said, that even Odin would struggle to manage it.

"Yes." Loki agreed. "Unless one came to know how Yggdrasil connects two worlds. Before today I had only ever been on the one realm, so I only knew of one root. But today-"

"Today you went to Asgard." Tony nodded, only slightly disbelieving. "So, what, you can get to Asgard?"

As Loki grinned, Tony pieced together the rest of the unspoken clues.

"Whoa, now, Nick Cage, you cannot just go in there and steal the Declaration of Independence."

"I do not understand half of what you say." Loki admitted graciously.

"If you get caught, they are not going to be happy with you."

"You have a talent for understatement, Tony."

"It's a gift."

Loki simply smiled at him, and Tony licked his chapped lips. "Um," he started, suddenly remembering vivid images of only a few days before of Loki pressed from thigh to chest up against him, freezing and unexpected and crazy. "Are we going to talk about what happened?" Because if Loki had no objections, Tony wouldn't mind trying it again, especially if the sorcerer could do that heating spell thing on the human prior to kissing him senseless with those frozen lips.

"Is this quite the time?"

"It wasn't exactly appropriate timing when you kissed me, either." Tony pointed out.

"Tony, I am about to go running headfirst into Asgard, where no one quite pointedly wants me to be, and will execute me for being there and yet you want to discuss your libido?"

"Hey, I've already said it was a dumb idea, but you ignored me. I'm just focusing on the other stupid things you've done since I've arrived."

Loki's contempt for him was almost tangible. "It was a mistake."

"Was it?" Tony challenged. "Because I don't think it was."

The human was fixed with a hard stare, which ended with a sharp sigh. "Perhaps not."

The silence now between them was uneasy, and Tony took it upon himself to break it by storming up to the Jötun prince, catching his face between his hands and firmly pressing their lips together.

"There, that wasn't so hard, was it?" Loki huffed a breath at him, before pushing him away. Tony resisted the action, drawing him ever closer.

"I will need to head recklessly into danger sooner rather than later, Stark." Loki informed him, reverting to his last name as a play at seriousness. "Perhaps goodbyes are prudent."

"It's bad luck to say goodbye." Tony returned mindlessly instead with: "What do we say to the god of death?"

"There is no god of death."

Tony considered this. "That works too."

A roar from a beast split them apart, and they glanced over to see a squadron of the Fire Giants looming over the horizon. It was not just golems this time, but men who looked an awful lot like the red version of the Jötuns. They were blazing bright, footsteps sizzling the snow as they stormed forward, armed with swords alight with flames.

"You are going to get into so much shit for this, aren't you?" Tony said, backing away.

"Undoubtedly."

Loki lashed out an took his hand, pressing something into it. "Keep it close,"He said urgently, closing Tony's fingers around it firmly. "And whatever you do, do not lose it. Now, run."

Tony did precisely as he was told, booting up his thrusters and flying up into the air. He glanced around only to see whether Loki was okay, but he had already disappeared without so much as a wisp in the wind to punctuate his absence.

Iron Man looked down into his fist, and he saw the red and gold ring he'd found in the battlefield where he'd first met the Jötun prince.

"Damn it, Loki." He cursed, not daring to go back to camp in case the soldiers and golems followed him. Instead he looked back, making sure they were still hot on his heels, before turning and pointing anything deadly or explosive their way. "Guys," he tried to call out through the comms, but since it was still night none of the Avengers would hear him. "Come on, I need a little help."

But he didn't receive any answer.

\--

It's Býleistr who found him, hardly an hour later, with Helblindi and seven other Frost Giants in close pursuit.

"Man of Iron?" The giant among giants questioned as Tony landed to greet them, thankful for their sudden appearance. Býleistr swiped a hand at a golem, throwing it to the floor before smashing the handle of his battle-axe down on the creature's head.

"Where's my brother?" Helblindi roared across the expanse of space, as two Fire Giants set upon him.

Tony didn't reply, struggling as he was to attack and keep the bastards down without getting too close. The natives of Muspelheim radiated enough heat to melt the suit at ten paces.

It was only when a sharp burst of ice, similar to Loki's attack on Surtur but at a quarter of the strength, hit the remaining few warriors that Tony was able to stop for breath. But even that was denied him, however, when Helblindi grabbed his armour with icy hands and shook him violently. The ring dropped from Tony's grip, and the Frost Giants looked down at it blankly.

Helblindi knelt, waving his palm over the jewel and snarling. "He enchanted this. We've been following a false trail. Where is he?"

Tony didn't answer.

"You will tell me," The prince growled, stalking up into Tony's space and staring down Iron Man's visor. "Or so help me-"

But he was stopped when a Jötun further afield suddenly cried out. The warrior had been inspecting the bodies, stabbing the ones which were still twitching, until he'd come across one only playing at dead. The enemy stood up now, screaming loud, as a hundred new soldiers appeared from over the snowy dunes.

"Shit!" Tony shot off into the air, looking down at the scene with a bird's eye view, before forcing himself back to the ground to help the small Jötun party.

Three had already been slain, and the others were retreating on Helblindi's orders. The only one still left in the fray was Býleistr, who took down more than any of the other Frost Giants combined. His white teeth were spotted with red, bared and gleaming dangerously, killing Fire Giants left and right, but despite all his strength he was still being forced to back away.

Tony fell upon the ground beside him, helping clear the way backwards until they'd made it to the edge of the attack and were able to turn and make a run for it.

"Býlesitr!" Helblindi called as they twisted around and thrust forwards. Or, at least, that was the plan, until a burning hand wrapped around Tony's shin. He could feel the instantly molten metal drip down his leg and he screamed. He was distantly aware that he wasn't the only one, as they had grabbed Býlesitr by the waist and dragged him down too. However, Býleistr's own temperature worked as his own defence, in that it made his captors screech as he did. He clawed his way from their grip, before grabbing Tony's arm.

The human was yanked in two directions, by strong, painful hands both ways, but he'd much prefer to go with the one who was giving him frostbite than the one who was trying to burn the skin from his leg.

"Please!" He yelled to the Frost Giant. _Please do not let me go_. But when Tony felt more hands join the Fire Giant behind him he knew he was a lost cause.

"Don't!" He still tried when Býleistr's fingers slipped from his arm and when the Jötun immediately counted his losses and turned his back and fled for safety. Rationally, the inventor knew it was the only sensible thing to do. The Jötun army were already too few without losing one of their greatest assets, and to them Tony was worth nothing, but that didn't mean that Tony was going to just accept it.

"Help me!" He screamed, not only to the Frost Giants backing away from him, but through the comms. "Steve, Bruce, Nat! Someone! Please!"

But still, no one answered.


	3. Chapter 3

Loki didn't waste any time upon returning, not daring to linger where the demons of Muspelheim had been, even now he had the ultimate weapon to fight them. He was still unaware of how precisely it worked, though the Casket of Ancient Winters had felt disquietingly natural in his hands as soon as he had plucked it from its perch.

He called out to the camp when he strolled in, surprised to see both of his brothers absent. His father had left for the city the evening before, so the only ones who came out to greet him were Thor and the heroes of Midgard, minus a certain Iron Man.

He grinned slowly at Thor, who narrowed his eyes suspiciously at the Frost Giant, observing how Loki was once again in his pale, green-eyed disguise.

"What have you done?"

"Where are my brothers?"

Thor took him by a shoulder, pulling him with all his might around to face the Avengers. "What did you do?"

"I ensured our victory, thunder god," Loki returned. "And I made sure we now have soldiers to spare."

"You went back to Asgard?" Natasha asked, and Clint spluttered in disbelief.

"Did you take the Casket?" Thor growled, letting loose a noise of exasperation when Loki only smiled again. " _How_?"

"With great skill and a slither of magic." Loki boasted.

"It is watched over by Heimdall, my mother  _and_  my father!"

"How did you even get there?" Clint inserted, over Thor's continued gaping.

"The weapons vault is protected by the Destroyer!"

"Aptly named." It had been something that Loki, admittedly, had not seen coming. It had decimated almost the entire room and was only by luck that the Jötun had gotten away. "It was hardly difficult." He said to the staring crowd. "The realms are open to any sorcerer with skill enough to find the path. Your Heimdall is not so hard to dupe, either. You dismiss magic so quickly in Asgard, the fault lies only with you."

It was then when his brothers returned, bursting through the gates and closing it as if the Overthrower himself was chasing after them. They were wild-eyed and panting, along with three short of the usual party number. Loki saw the burns crossing more than one of his fellows, and then the severe injuries sustained by Býleistr, and the crown prince could piece together the rest of the puzzle.

"Where is he?" He questioned, eyes wide and focused on the glaring absence of a particular presence.

Helblindi snarled in reply, shoving Loki back into the ice of a hut, arm at Loki's throat as the smaller Frost Giant clawed at it ineffectually. "You almost had us all killed, you and that mortal! Three of our own perished! Look at your brother, Loki! Look at him!"

Loki did. Býleistr was clutching at the skin around his stomach, half of his body blistered and sizzling with the heat. The Jötun was shaking, gritting his teeth, cutting himself off mid-whimper whenever anyone touched him. Loki observed the brother he'd watched grow and he was sorry.

"Where is Tony?" Captain America reiterated Loki's question. "You said you were going to get him."

Helblindi's arm pressed a little harder at his brother's neck. "His  _majesty_ ," he spat. "Sent us on a false trail, a plot which involved your smitten Man of Iron. As it turned out, the Fire Giants had also had the means to track down the magic."

The Avengers looked to Loki accusingly, but Loki didn't have the time to worry about them. "Let me up." He demanded. "In Ymir's name, release me." But his brother did nothing.

"You knew." Natasha spat coldly, rallying her team closer together protectively. "You knew they would find him."

"He has proved himself a worthy warrior time after time," The prince tried to defend his actions, but could read in their stance that until Tony was returned to them safely there would be no reprieve for him. "I expected him to be capable of a few Fire Giants."

"He wasn't! And neither were we! Three of us are  _dead_ , Loki." Helblindi pressed him further into the frozen wall, firmly cutting off his airways. Loki's nails sunk a little deeper into the blue flesh of his brother's arm, but he knew that he wouldn't be able to win this fight on strength alone. A spark of magic, designed to send a current down the muscle to make Helblindi flinch away, only enraged the giant more. He did not let go. As the crown prince grew weaker his disguise fell, and he could see himself turning back to his usual skin colour - that tone that was just that bit lighter than his family's and that of his species; marking him that much more different than he already was.

His last defence was teleportation and so he willed himself away, but Helblindi was a sorcerer talented enough to stop unwanted spell-casting. That was about the moment when Loki realised the last thing he might ever see would be the blood-red eyes of his younger brother.

"Stop! Helblindi, please!" It was Býleistr, oozing and wheezy and disorientated from the fight, that proved to be Loki's saving grace. Just as the world started to spin out of Loki's reach, Helblindi dropped him.

Natasha and Clint were hovering over his head when he opened his eyes several minutes later. Still heaving for breath, Loki could hardly address them, so he took a minute to wonder where Clint had pulled that bow and arrow from.

"Where's Tony?"

Loki shook his head, because he didn't know. He was still woefully uninformed about their enemy's actions and motivations, much less the layout of their camps or where they kept their prisoners. If they even did.

Natasha pointed her wrist at him, which Loki could only presume meant there were more to her circlets than met the eye. "You're the reason he was taken. So you will help us get him back."

Loki felt capable of sitting up, but it was only with the help of Captain Rogers and Thor that he managed it gracefully. With a voice that was admittedly on the croaky side, Loki spoke to all present souls with as much resolve and surety as he could feasibly lie about.

"Yes, it's my fault. Yes, perhaps I should have underestimated the Iron Man rather than over. But what's done is done, and you will find it was all quite necessary."

"That damned Casket was worth more than Tony?" Clint shouted, drawing back the unwanted attention of Laufey's second son.

"The Casket?" He rounded on Loki again, and it was only Thor stepping in front of Helblindi which stopped the determined path towards him. "You got it? How?"

"Asgard believes themselves so impregnable that they are not cautious enough." Loki tutted, earning him a glare from the blond Áss, but no comment opposing it. "Here." Loki summoned the blue box, holding it lightly with peaceful intents. In his grasp it shone bright, more lustrous and awe-inspiring between his fingers than it had ever been within the cage of weapons Odin kept.

All eyes stared at the throbbing pulse of light and energy weaving itself through and around the Casket and up Loki's arms. It beat in time with his heart, becoming ever brighter, ever stronger, the longer it was in his grasp, back on Jötunheim where it called home.

Around them the suddenly ice shone like diamonds, glinting, dazzling, blinding. The world seemed beautiful for a moment, glorious and strong, worthy of the mighty race the Jötuns once knew themselves as, until Helblindi dove for it and Loki sent it back to the hidden pocket of space with a simple wave of his hand.

"Father will need that." Helblindi said sternly, but Loki shrugged, uncaring.

"I'm going on a treacherous journey to save the ridiculous mortal in enemy territory." Loki returned. "I need it more."

"Such power should not be wielded for the sake of one human!"

"Hey!" Clint growled, in precise time with the other Avengers who all simultaneously shifted into attack position. Bruce Banner, Loki was particularly wary about, because he'd seen what the green one could do when he felt his comrades were threatened. "Stark is a nut-job for going along with  _this_  crazy fucker's tricks, but he is our family and he is worth every damn treasure you've got to give."

Steve Rogers, usually so quick to apologise for any apparently transgression in the appropriate behaviour of his fellows, did not argue against Clint's harsh words and quick tongue. All he did was loom threateningly, arms raised, ready and willing to draw blood if that was what it came to.

Helblindi studied them, and realised that, mortal or not, they would not be humans worth crossing. They put their teammate's life before his, and would fight tooth and claw to get him back. Which was precisely what Tony needed if this rescue mission stood even a chance of succeeding.

"Fine." He eventually spat at them, before pointing a finger at Loki. "I'm sending word to father. When he returns here, so will you."

"Send me a summons." Loki agreed vaguely, finally picking himself up and brushing his clothing down. Slowly, his fingers paled and the world felt distinctly colder. Not enough to freeze from it, but certainly enough to feel uncomfortable. His brother looked upon the mask with disgust, before storming away to his cabin.

As they went to leave, Captain America briefly detouring by way of the Avengers' sleeping place and returning with a circular shield, along with Thor who called the legendary Mjölnir to his hand and Hawkeye collecting his quiver, Loki was stopped by a blistered hand catching his wrist.

Loki turned and looked upon the visage of his youngest brother kneeling in the snow. Even from his fallen position, Býleistr was above Loki's eye-level, and he gazed at him very seriously. Apologetically, even.

"I'm sorry for losing your human." He said, but Loki denied this and kissed his brother's forehead.

"Get well, and do not fret. He is not lost yet."

\--

He found the ring in the snow at the edge of the fiery line which dictated Fire Giant ownership of the ground. He broke the enchantment on the miniscule object more violently than necessary, attempting to let loose the frustration and terror welling up inside of him.

"Does that mean we're stuck?" Banner asked, correctly deducing what finding the ring meant. There was now no way to trace the path Tony took. Clenching his fist around the jewel, Loki shook his head.

"We will find him." He swore, because for all the reckless things Tony had done for him over the last few days, Loki owed him his much. "I swear on it, Dr. Banner."

He'd swear on his life if he had to.

\--

They find him screaming. Ludicrously, Loki can only be thankful that at least Tony has the breath to spare for it.

He'd been flitting in and out of the camps sparsely, but wisely, whilst Thor flew wide over the area, acting a distraction. Clint was with Loki, as his were eyes keener than any human the Frost Giant had before met, whilst Natasha skulked around the camps the teleporting duo had not bothered to approached. Banner stayed behind, ready and on call to, as the humans said, 'hulk out' at the first sign of trouble.

"Can't see for shit." Clint said, wincing through the smoke, and Loki couldn't help but agree. It was horrible here, and there was no way to cut through the smog without alerting the Fire Giants and the blazing, ghastly creatures to their presence.

Which is why the screaming could only be considered a saving grace, leading them to where they could not see.

"We've found something." The archer said promptly into the comm-link before even moving. He was better trained than Loki was, therefore, since Loki had jerked up and approached the noise before Hawkeye had even finished his sentence. "Loki!" The human hissed, ineffectually, before he dragged himself up with a sigh.

"Tony!" Loki had torn the human down from where he was tied to a post without consideration to himself. Loki gave no mind to the stinging of the burns across his palms from the red-hot iron chain, instead focusing on the human, charred and smoking and bleeding and gasping, who collapsed on top of him. Tony's hands clawed at Loki's skin, trying to use his naturally low temperature, even under the guise of the Æsir, as a balm for his feverish body.

They'd ripped him of his protective armour, Loki saw, deliberately blistered his skin, attempted to melt him down, and made dangerous black marks around the light which glowed from Tony's chest. Loki, when he'd first seen the arc reactor on the night he spent with the group, had been told it kept him alive. The human had something wrong with his heart, and this was the only cure. That the Fire Giants hadn't damaged it was a miracle.

"There's more." Clint observed, and Loki strained to see over the human's head. The archer was counting along similar posts to the one Tony had been held on, looking across the forms of too many missing Jötun warriors, most of which were dead. They were tied with enchanted rope, glowing red with heat but not breakable under sheer force alone.

"Two are breathing." He gestured to them, flicking out a knife from somewhere and going to cut them down. Then something occurred to the human, and he looked to Loki expectantly. Immediately the prince saw the problem, and, reluctantly, he handed the other mortal over to his brother-in-arms, before snatching up the knife and cutting down his own brothers himself. The most these men would do should they touch Loki's skin was turn him back to his natural blue, assuming he wasn't paying attention to maintaining the illusion. What they could do to a human's body was that significantly worse.

"Hey, hey, I gotcha." Clint was saying to Tony, who was babbling about something, something about heat and gloom and caves. Loki could only count two of those things here, but didn't have the time to pry into some deeper, darker part of the inventor's psyche; not when he was trying to gather up two immensely large and heavy Frost Giants into his arms.

"Perhaps I can help." A deep voice boomed, and Loki thankfully unloaded one of his burdens into Thor's awaiting hands without thinking of the consequences. In a valiant display of his honour, pride and that rumoured worthiness, Thor bit down on whatever pained noise had attempted to claw its way up his throat.

Loki had never understood the obsessive words and stories from other realms about the thunder god, especially when Loki had returned home one day to find another of the crumbling Jötun city destroyed, over a hundred Jötuns dead, and his youngest brother permanently scarred by the hand of a man so fawned over across the branches of Yggdrasil. But now, with Thor here, helping them, trying to undo past wrongs and bearing the punishment that came with it, Loki found it within him to reach out and display a bit of gratitude.

His fingers brushed the back of the Áss' hand, and green light danced around and then sunk into Thor's flesh, briefly illuminating the veins underneath the skin. Immediately the tenseness around the blond lessened, as he was able to carry the Frost Giant that bit easier.

"You can make a man resistant to the dangers of your kin's flesh?" Thor wondered, staring at Loki with appreciation. The Jötun prince shook his head.

"The charm will simply lessen the pain. I shall heal you properly when we return to safety."

But safety suddenly seemed a long way away.

The Fire Giants and monsters of Muspelheim came upon the six of them in crashing waves, weapons aflame, mouths gaping with blood-curling battle cries, ready to slaughter them remorselessly. Three of the company were in no position to fight back, so Loki and Thor placed their charges down to the floor, regretful of the burn the heated ground gave the Frost Giants, but unable to change it. They stood protectively over the prone bodies, unwilling to lose even another soul to the beasts tearing towards them.

Tony, however, proved to be a problem.

As Clint tried to put him down, the human darted from the archer's grasp and latched on to the already disadvantaged Jötun. He was overheating, outnumbered, with no real backup to count on. He was already trying to protect someone else, and could not afford to have an injured, shaking, severely upset human disabling him any further.

"Stark, let go of me." He warned, but neither tone nor usage of his surname deterred the man. Loki realised he couldn't dislodge Tony without aggravating the human's wounds or hurting him further, so he was forced to lose the use of one hand to wrap securely around the smaller man's waist to keep him upright.

"I want to be standing up when I die. I refuse to be helpless." Tony said, surprisingly lucidly considering the amount of pain he was in. Loki could hardly argue with a last wish.

He managed to erect a semi-translucent shield for their immediate area, significantly stemming the overflow of Fire Giants and their golems from reaching them quite as easily. It made for better crushing, or shooting, or slashing. Tony was kicking at golem heads, smashing them underfoot, eager to play his part.

"Why do you not hurt me?" Tony asked, delirium having long since softened the edges of reality and misaligned the human's priorities. "Normally Frost Giants give everyone else frost bite. Why don't you?"

Loki mustered up every tattered remain of his not insufficient acting ability and channelled it into keeping a hold of his patience. Whilst he longed to very sharply inform the inventor that now was  _not_  the time to as such asinine questions when he was covered in Fire Giant blood and clinging onto his charge for dear life, he instead managed to soften his tone and humour the man who clutched to him just as tightly in return.

"I am not an average Jötun, Tony. I think you may have noticed."

"I had." Tony's voice was almost lost under the brutal clash of weapons, and the wet stab of flesh. "You're intelligent and irresponsible and just a little bit insane. And you're so beautiful."

"Only princesses are beautiful, or don't you recall?"

"No. Only you." Perhaps Tony had hit his head. It would have been a sensible explanation for why he was now spouting utter gibberish.

"That's sweet." Clint sneered, having given up shooting whatever foe drew near and was now stabbing at them with whatever arrows he had left. Occasionally he sent one flying in a high arc, which, upon impact with some unlucky soul, exploded spectacularly. Other times he drew that hidden dagger and cut throats with startling efficiency. "Speaking of sweet, Nat, where in the hell are you?"

Perhaps the Black Widow replied through the comms, but Loki was distracted from the archer by a tug at his chest. Quite literally, the centre of his being was jerked in a southern direction, and it even threw Tony's balance. He'd have fallen quite ungracefully had he not been clutching at Loki like a lifeline.

"What was that?"

Loki tore his spear through another ribcage, splashing the both of them with gore, and answered, "My brother. I presume he wants me to return."

"Tell him we're a little caught up."

"Better," Loki said, taking a moment to wave a hand and pray in the name of his ancestors that Thor and Hawkeye were watching his back. "I'm calling for help." The distress sigil would burn an ominous red, staining the ice in front his brother like an omen. They would come at once, since Loki was their only chance at the return of the Casket of Ancient Winters.

He hadn't used it yet for several reasons, but the main one was that he had bigger, more important plans for the heart and soul of Jötunheim. All he had to do was survive and wait.

When the missing Avengers arrived, they announced themselves with great aplomb. The Hulk that Banner became leapt in from a disquieting distance, bigger than any of the Fire Giants, broader, and so much stronger. He tore at them, punched at them, massacred them without regret. He took a single glance at Tony, before standing solidly in front of his fellows, precisely as he had the first time Loki and he had met. He stopped the enemy from approaching, protected his own, made sure that he did everything he could to hurt them before they hurt his team.

Natasha and Steve were right behind him, Natasha shooting her way through with deadly competence and Steve barrelling down the droves of red bodies by slamming into them with his shield. Whatever it was made of, it seemed unbreakable, immune to heat, and protected him incredibly. When he reached the tightly gathered Avengers and Loki, he let it loose, and Loki took a second to watch the way it flew, controlled and remarkable, knocking the opponents down one right after another. It returned to his arms in a flash, having made a circle around his group, now standing on Tony's open side, eying the gathering Fire Giants.

Loki didn't allow himself long to be appreciative of the Avengers and their surprising set of skills, instead focusing on the continued well-being of himself and the mad human who was still fighting with all his might. Furious and injured and defenceless, he still felt as if he needed to help.

"I will not be the one left standing because I didn't  _do_  anything." He informed Loki when he caught the curious look. "I've seen people die because of me, and that is  _not_  happening again."

This was no place to ask, but Loki still itched with the questions eager to be spoken.

He was distracted by a sword which Captain America missed, a body charging at them with clear intents to kill. It was aimed straight at their injured party, and Loki had no choice but to push Tony backwards and catch himself on the blade.

It  _burned_. From the inside out, he could feel it piece his side, and it set his body aflame. His weapon was too large to use in such close combat, so it was his nails and magic which tore the stomach out of the Fire Giant and sent it careening to the ground. The blade went with the carcass, but the fire of the wound did not die down.

"Shit, Loki!" But Loki had gone from one bad moment to another. He can't even begin to summon up the smallest bit of ice to soothe the pain, hard enough as it was in the blistering heat, before the armies of Muspelheim stop dead, and the pounding of something evil storming its way towards them made itself known.

Even Tony, fretting over Loki's injury as he had been only seconds earlier, turned around to stare aghast over Thor's shoulder.

"That's a big Fire Giant." Clint said blankly, as Surtur laughed at the sight he was faced with - a noise which could have been mistaken for a roar.

Loki instinctively called upon his magic again, calling out his distress to more than one front. Perhaps the other idiots hadn't figured it out yet. Just in case, this would be their prompt, blaring like an alarm. Not even the dimmest of all their kind would be able to overlook it.

"We're going to die." The archer continued, but it was a statement that seemed vulgar in its obviousness. Tony took it upon himself to lift his body away from Loki's, just so he could stand straight and stare down death on his own terms. Such stubbornness and helplessness was the final straw, and that which solidified Loki's next decisions.

Now free, he was able to move away from the human, mindless of his injury. He pushed himself through Clint and Thor, dragging the thunder god with him as he went. The two of them flanked the front of the Avengers, whilst the Hulk guarded their back. The green man was heaving with fury where the rest of them were working on catching their breaths. Loki would have liked to utilise the Hulk's strength, but he trusted Thor's skill with Mjölnir as much as he knew Banner would protect the more fragile of the group with his life, and Loki had yet to see a blow which so much as dazed the green creature. If Loki failed, the Hulk would not when it came to the safety of his companions.

"Surtur!" He called up, and the Fire Giant, looming and terrifying, smiled at him with good humour; it chilled Loki to the marrow of his bones.

"The little bee with the icy sting. Where is your flying machine?"

"'Tis no business of yours, Surtur, what secrets I wish to keep."

"You believe you can win against me?"

Everything was falling around Loki's ears and he knew it. He could feel the world crumble and burn as he stared upon the mountainous form of the fiery monster, because there was no one left to help them. His father's army would not reach them in time, and the warriors he was counting on rushing over to save their necks had long since failed to arrive.

He hoped Heimdall was watching, as the all-seeing god swore he would. Loki wished with every fibre of his being that the Áss would see what Asgard's lack of action did to the crown prince of Jörunheim and these heroes of Midgard who stood solidly behind him.

And slowly, a smile spread across Loki's face. Because he still had a few tricks up his sleeve, and he nowhad the motivation to win. Tony said it first: these people were  _not_ going to die for him. Not when he could do something to stop it.

"Thor," he snapped, but the blond was a step ahead of him, Mjölnir swinging, and Thor grabbing Loki by the waist. They shot off into the sky, faster than Surtur could follow, until they were at his eyelevel.

"What do you plan to do, little monster?" Surtur grinned, bright and hot and burning. Loki put out of mind any fear, any doubt, any nerves. He might die, but now was not the time to be scared. Now was the time put but his neck on the line to save his homeland and these confounded boneheaded mortals who followed him so blindly into the thick of it.

He thought of Býleistr, so strong and kind and apologetic,  then of Helblindi, who was stubborn and determined and influential. He thought of Tony, burning and angry and clinging to him, and he thought of the humans down below, surrounded and outnumbered by Fire Giants, on the brink of death, but still fighting the good fight.

It was those thoughts that forced his hand, along with every life he'd save on his dark, cold, abandoned realm. The Casket came into his grasp, pulled from the outer reaches of nowhere, and it blazed blue and white, dazzling and perfect. It fed from his hatred, his desperation, his last hopes and produced a mighty wind, ice and snow and the frozen breath of Jötunheim herself. A cursed spear had caused Surtur the temporary loss of his limb; had produced a tortured sound that shook the ice dunes and frosty mountains.  _That_  was nothing but a swipe of a sorcerer's spell and the aim of a warrior's hand. This was the realm of ice encompassing a fire demon within its arms, dragging every bit of magic and passion from the planet and projecting it onto its biggest threat. It was revenge for every slice of land Surtur's armies left burnt and battered, it was every ounce of loathing from every Jötun's soul, and it was the freezing touch of power the universe had not seen in centuries, and the Fire Giants were ill-prepared for.

"You are nothing without your sword." Loki snarled, focusing everything he had at Surtur, knowing that finally he would have some form of victory. "You cannot compare to the might of Jötunheim!"

The Casket eventually teetered off, it's power drained along with the prince's, and its purpose done. Loki teleported away from Thor's hold and back to Tony's side, looking up to what was the great Surtur, now encased in ice, possibly dead, but likely not.

Not until, at least, Thor took it upon himself to smash at the head with his mighty hammer until there was no more.

Tony was not the only one staring at him, and it was then that they all realised the ceasefire had only been so Surtur could take away the victory. Now he was out of action there was no reason for the Fire Giants to hold back. In fact, upon the visage of the headless ice-cube which was once their great leader, they were only more enraged.

The Avengers pressed close together, Tony in the middle and Loki pushing the human behind him. He grabbed the spear he'd abandoned on the red-hot floor and clutched at Tony's sleeve with the other.

He realised then that he was in his natural skin yet again, and his side was stained with red and oozing blue, his hands were shaking and his eyes were hazy. The heat of his surroundings seemed significantly more intense, and the arm he held radiated warmth enough to make Loki want to tear himself away. But he couldn't. Not yet. He needed to make sure Tony was safe.

He tried again with his father, but there was no return word. This time, he wasn't even sure if he'd managed to send any sort of signal at all. Likely they were still too far away. Without flight and without teleportation, the Jötun army was stuck with travel on the vargr, which, although fast, would find it difficult crossing the terraformed land which burnt like hot coals beneath bare feet.

He could not use the Casket a second time so soon, not when he had used it to defeat such an immense monster. He could hardly even keep it hidden away, and he struggled to keep his grip on the pocket of space he'd sequestered it away in; magic he normally had masterful control over spluttered and failed to comply to his demands.

He slashed at the devils coming towards him, beheading them, slashing at their chests and faces and legs, sending them to the ground and stabbing them smartly when they were down. Tony had procured a spare weapon from the Black Widow, and it was small, compact, and seemed to say his name across the nozzle of it.

"This is an antique." He mentioned off hand when he caught Loki looking. "From before I shut down the weapons division."

"It's a good gun." Natasha mentioned, as Stark aimed around his shield of allies and aimed at the Fire Giants in quick succession, before stopping to reload. Some of his shots went wide, as his injuries helped him even less than they did Loki, but the flaming beasts were packed so close together it made no difference.

"I remember designing this." He said, as Loki threw up another shield when he saw he had once again run short on ammunition. "Nasty little thing."

There was another short bursts of bullets, until that was it - Tony could do no more with the weapon. He threw the gun against the ground and self-preservation dictated he hide behind his Frost Giant protector again.

Loki gave up trying to keep a hold of his magic when he felt Tony suddenly lean against him, warm and terrible, but something of a much needed comfort.

The Casket came to his now free hand, unrestricted by the magic holding it where it was hidden, and it hung limply in his grasp, heavy and useless, shining like a beacon, still happy to be home, but serving no more purpose for Loki that it would for Thor.

Next to them, Clint had reached for Natasha's arm. He was bleeding, bruised, with a black eye and a damaged leg, and had his knife in one hand and any spare arrows were still in his quiver, waiting to be utilised as hand-weapons if the worst came to the worst. Again. As it seemed to be looking to do. Natasha, in turn, took a moment to twist her hand and catch his, kissing his knuckles, before letting them go again and turning back to the onslaught. She had a tear across her shoulder from a wound which dragged down her back, and she, as they all were, was blackened with ash and soot, dirty and grimy and unwavering in her merciless carnage.

Thor paid no mind to affection, smashing his way through their foes, and he was truly the most likely to come out of this, barring Banner. Banner himself, Hulked up and green and howling to the sky, was causing more damage alone than the rest of the Avengers managed collectively. He could jump further, could not be extensively hurt, and nor did he seem to run out of energy.

Steve reached out for Tony, touching his shoulders, saying goodbye. A brother's embrace, fleeting but true, emotive and enough. And that was it. From then, they were ready. Come hell or high water, they had said their farewells and accepted their fate. It might them fight harder, stronger, a sudden burst of vigour which took the Fire Giants by surprise. Despite the sudden influx of dead giants, not one of the seven entertained the illusion that they were going to survive.

A flash of light paused everything, as all present creatures shied away from it - the sudden blinding white a direct contrast to the low fires and smoggy atmosphere. It pierced through the smoke and dust like a blade did flesh, and when it cleared Loki could have slumped to the floor with relief.

He was held up only by the body behind him, reminding him he wasn't the only one he was supporting, along with the hatred and anger which had fled upon Surtur's death, but was now re-emerging anew upon this late arrival.

Odin All-Father stood in golden glory upon a sharp rocky rise, staring down on the Fire Giants disdainfully. At his back stood an army - thousands of Æsir, fresh and poised and armed and dangerous. All that kept them still was an order. At a moment's notice, they would attack.

And with nothing more than a hand signal from the Victory Father, that was precisely what they did.

The Avengers kept at it themselves, brutally hacking at bodies until they were stopped as the army of Asgard reached them, pulled them away, dragged the two unconscious Jötuns with them. Somewhere along the way, lost in the last desperate scuffles and sudden jerking as the Æsir forcefully took over, Loki's hand, sweating and shivering from heat and pain, slipped from the Casket. He'd have taken the time to look for it, certainly, had he not been busy hurting and making sure Tony was still beside him. He could feel it, humming for him, calling out to him, but he couldn't get away, not with the human inventor now taking his wrist and dragging him further away from the fray.

A battle-cry cut through the din of clashing swords and dying screams, as, from the south, finally emerged Laufey and his blood-thirsty warriors. They joined in the battle, blindly slashing their way through the creatures which had taken so much from them, Laufey at the forefront, eyes wild with rage, and Helblindi coming close behind him. Even Býleistr, still severely wounded from his last clash with the Fire Giants, was there, running in after his family, tearing at those who wronged him so. The Jötuns were weaker than usual, obviously so, sick with the overpowering heat and stench of the smoke, but it was  _their_  realm and  _their_  fight, and they were not about to let Asgard take all the glory from them.

That said, it was due in no small part to the realm eternal and its people that the fighting eventually died down. Silence finally fell. There were less Jötuns than before, but not any more than could have been expected. There were relatively few Æsir losses, and the Avengers were thanking their lucky stars for Loki's shields and the Hulk and Thor's enthusiasm. Without which, not all of them would have made it.

There were no more breathing Fire Giants. Not even prisoners had been taken. There had been no clemency shown today.

What was left was a god on a horse, and the king of the Frost Giants snarling frightfully up at him.

Such looks were ignored by Odin, and he approached Loki slowly, eying him with no shortage of fury.

"Return what you took from us immediately, Loki Laufeyson."

But Loki couldn't say anything. He couldn't  _do_  anything. He stared down the god of gods, defiant, because that was all he could do. He'd misplaced the Casket. He knew it was upon the ground somewhere close, ignored and overlooked for this newest drama, but he did not know where.

Then Loki's father spoke into the tense echo of the battlefield. Worse, he held up something shining and blue. "I wonder what it is you seek after, All-Father."

Odin's hand lashed out as attention drew away from him and towards the grinning Jötun king, catching Loki's collar and yanking him away from the Avengers. Tony's hand, even as securely wrapped around Loki's wrist as it was, was ripped away from him as Odin dragged him back.

Each Avenger jerked forward in protest, faces angry, stances quite prepared to take on the entirety of Asgard's forces to get Loki back, and perhaps they might have even done it had Odin not pressed the tip of Gungnir to Loki's jugular.

There was no point in protesting after that. Even those who did not know a great deal about Odin could still tell how serious the god was, and how prepared he was to take Loki's life if he felt he had to.

Loki's eyes found Laufey's. Laufey was glancing back and forth between Odin, Loki and the Casket. He allowed a brief look to his other two sons, who held their breaths and awaited any kind of instruction. They were no help, and they were not people to turn to when seeking advice. Loki knew that look far too well, as he was the oldest, the cleverest, and always the one his father sought out when he wanted a wise answer. Loki thought differently, he always said. Everything about Loki was different.

The king was clearly conflicted. In his hand was the Casket, which had always responded to him better than it had any other wielder before or since. He was ambitious, intelligent, and opportunistic, which the power source of Jötunheim needed. It craved more energy, more control, and it had been the reason Laufey had marched against those other realms. He had been loath to let the Casket slip from his grasp, and detested the idea of it happening a second time. However, keeping it would mean losing his son and his heir. His strange little sorcerer. The son he kept despite himself, despite the whispers, despite the mocking. The son who grew up to be more than anyone ever expected, and who found the means to bring the Casket back home when all others failed.

Laufey glanced up, and caught the red of his son's eyes. "What should I do, my child?"

"I may be bias this once, my father." Loki managed, of all things, to laugh. It was a short sound, harsh and cut off as the blade of Odin's spear bit into the skin of his neck. "His Majesty should do only what is right."

Loki was stating, in as plain terms as he could, that he could not answer this conundrum for Laufey. Loki would have picked himself over the box, but then Loki didn't know the glory of the world with the Casket there to restore it to its former beauty. But either way, should Laufey keep it or not, Loki never would.

It took a moment, but eventually the Avengers started to realise something was seriously wrong. It was in the twitching of Laufey's mouth, the sudden blankness in Odin's eyes, and the way Loki started to shift and struggle under the blade of the sceptre. The façade of calm he tried to present only further outlined his panic. That was about when Tony drew the line.

"You can't just  _kill_  him." He stepped forward, looking only to Loki's potential executioner and not the man who would willingly swap Loki's life for a glowing box.

"He broke into Asgard and stole the Casket." Odin replied swiftly. "He did not trip any alarms, and it was hours before we realised something was amiss. If he has succeeded once, what's to say he will not do so again? He is too dangerous to keep alive."

"He doesn't even get a fair trial? What if he had an ulterior motive for the theft?" Steve chimed in, stepping in line with Tony and glaring forcefully in that classic Steve Rogers way which never failed to make Tony uncomfortable in the face of it. The inventor could have kissed the captain for taking his side.

"Like what?"

"I don't know," Clint joined them, with Natasha on his left. "Like winning a losing war, saving an entire race, making sure a planet continues to exist. I think they're excusable motives, personally."

"His actions were hardly deplorable in the light of his situation." The red-haired assassin inserted lowly.

"His father will not hand back the treasure  _he_  wilfully negotiated to lose in order to stop the last war." Odin accused, sending his stormy blue eyes Laufey's way, but that was far from a good enough excuse, at least for Tony Stark.

"So, you're going to punish the son for his father's mistakes and cruelty?"

"If this is what gets through to him. We shall not stop until that casket is returned."

"This is fucking insane! Are you all out of your fucking minds?" Tony burst out, but was interrupted by that familiar smooth voice.

"Stark, stop, else you'll lose your tongue."

"You can't tell me to stop, you pompous dickbag. I'm trying to save your life."

"That makes thirteen insults of my person that could get you executed, Stark."

"Loki, this is  _not_  the time!"

"I beg to differ." Loki said, who was hyper-aware of precisely how little time he had left to waste.

"You can't do this." Tony tried anxiously, but the press of Gungnir against the Jötun's neck presented a credible counterargument.

"Father!" Thor barked, around the same time when Býleistr turned to his, proclaiming the same. "Stop this, please. He only had the best of intentions."

"Silence." Odin hissed. "You are still a naïve boy. You do not know of the craftiness of the Frost giants as I do. Intents mean  _nothing_."

"Tony, Tony," Loki spoke sharply, drawing the human's attention, knowing that the seconds he had left were running thin. Tony looked to him, catching the small smile which was, he supposed, meant to be comforting.

"What  _do_  we say to the god of death?" The Jötun prince asked desperately, but Tony could not find it in him to reply honestly. It had only been a silly joke, a reference Loki would never have hoped to guess, and now seemed disgustingly inappropriate in the face of hard, terrifying reality.

"There is no god of death, Loki."

The prince nodded stiffly, closing his eyes, because  _of course_. Here came the end. The spear lifted away from his neck, but he knew this was no reprieve, merely the draw of the blade before it took away his life.

"Stop!"

Loki's eyes snapped open again, staring through the burning, bloody landscape and saw his father approaching. Odin's hand kept a firm hold of his collar, and it wasn't until Laufey tossed the Casket to the ground that the golden god pushed the prince away. Tony was the closest, and he lurched forward to wrap his arms around Loki's chest, pulling him away and back to the protective circle of Avengers who surrounded him solidly, shielded him for the men that would have killed him.

"You win, All-Father." Laufey said lowly, watching with some regret as some Æsir soldiers took hold of the Casket of Ancient Winters and hauled it away. "And we are not strong enough to threaten your departure, nor fight you should you wish it. However, you would find it wise to leave my company and my home sooner rather than later. But mark me," he approached the mighty Áss, tall enough to loom even over Odin on his mount. "If you ever threaten my son again I  _will_  destroy you."

Odin understood, nodding once and obediently backing away. This did not mean submission, but rather an appeal to maintain the treaty between the two realms; a treaty which was very nearly broken by the spilling of a prince's blood.

The Æsir forces gathered back together, and in another white hot flash of light, they were gone.

\--

As they walked away from the site of the battle, it became immediately clear how weak the Avengers were. The Hulk was carrying Tony, whilst Natasha and Clint clung onto each other, with Steve helping to keep the archer with the injured leg upright. Thor had his arm around the shoulder of a particularly drained Jötun, who felt he'd done too much in one day and wished only for sleep.

The other Frost Giants were hard at work with the land, stretching their elemental powers to the limit in an attempt to reclaim the burnt lands the Fire Giants destroyed. The Avengers walked away from them, Loki in tow, after Býleistr had caught up to him and expressed relief upon his continued existence.

Laufey did not approach his son, and nor did he stop him from walking away. Loki was sorely glad of that, unsure of what he might say should he speak to his father before he'd had chance to catch his breath and calm his frayed nerves.

The day was almost done, and it had worn on for far too long. When finally back at the camp after a rough ride on the vargr, they lay Tony and Clint down, along with Natasha who collapsed prone on the fur.

"We should return home." Cap said into the room, startling Tony and Thor. From where he lay, Hawkeye groaned approvingly.

"Thank Christ. Warmth and real food."

"A hospital would be appreciated." Natasha nodded, unable to see her injury but hyperaware that it looked as bad as it felt.

"We can't leave yet," Tony said sharply, surprisingly, since he'd done little but whine about the cold since they left the battle site. "Loki's not okay."

"I'll live, Stark." Loki rolled his eyes. "Magic fingers, remember?"

"You're running a little low there, Stephen."

"Fourteen."

"Hey, Stephen is a good magician." Tony defended.

"Then it would serve you well not to speak his name with such a derogatory tone."

"Yeah, I hate to break this stupid argument up, but about that hospital?" Clint snapped.

They agreed to wait until Banner had calmed down, which took hardly an hour. After which, they gathered up their meagre belongings and stood to say goodbye.

A trickle of Frost Giants had started to return from the battlefield, tired and bleeding or worse, and they were being seen to by healers which had come with Laufey from the city. They would have done no good with a human patient, considering their touch rendered such warm creatures frozen, so they had overlooked them. However, one spied Loki as he tried to slip away and attempted to draw him away to be treated. Already, as the time slipped by and Loki used it to rest, the magic was returning with his energy, and it was knitting together his side. It was a slow and arduous process, but one which had no need of healing hands. He batted the man away and exited the camp completely.

"We must be clear of any Jötuns," Thor informed them as they walked out into the white plains. He looked apologetic. "That includes you, your highness."

Loki couldn't deny the touch of panic which overcame him, but he didn't let it show. Neither did Tony, who kept his head up and was chatting with Bruce who held his injured form steady, retelling the fight with every gory detail for the sake of the man's holey memory.

It was only when Thor nodded, signalling that they were at an appropriate spot for the Bifrost to take them away, that the human inventor turned to Loki.

He reached out, took one blue hand, and said, "Come with me."

Such a ridiculous moral, he was. Loki could only shake his head at the mad-man before him. "Stay," he replied.

"I can't." Tony informed him. "I'm the head of a company, and I've got to look after my planet-"

"And so do I. I am the future king, Tony." Something the mortal had a habit of forgetting, it seemed.

"I don't want to leave you."

It seemed to take a lot out of Tony to admit it, and perhaps Loki should have been more comforting, but there was a clear solution to his problem. "Then don't."

"Don't say that," Tony warned. "Because if you do I really won't. I have people back home, and I can't just abandon them."

Loki nodded, stepping back and not allowing any uninvited emotions to cloud his judgement. "I understand." And he did. Loki could not leave either. He had obligations and duties and a family and a planet which relied on him. Tony, he knew, was exactly the same.

"Loki-"

But now was the time to bid adieu, and it seemed ridiculous to force it to take longer than was necessary. Quick and as painlessly as possible, Loki let the human go. "Goodbye, Tony Stark of Midgard-"

Tony had Loki's face in his hands and was pressing his lips to the Jötun's before Loki could finish his sentence. The prince clutched his shoulders before wrapping one arm around his neck, drawing him closer, kissing him harder. When they broke away, Loki was the first to speak.

"Tony, you should leave now."

"Or what?" Tony said, and the prince could feel the words as they brushed over his lips.

"Or I shall never let you go."

Tony reluctantly untangled himself, stepping backwards with some difficulty and latching back on to Bruce. As the light which brought Odin here surrounded them, Tony saw Loki staring at him, eyes blank and careful, holding himself back.

 _It's the only way_ , Tony thought.  _It's for the better_. As they shot off back to Asgard, the human had to soothe himself with the notion that it probably would have never had worked out anyway.

\--

Three weeks later, and Tony was functioning. He'd been stubbornly ignoring the doctor's orders for the last fortnight, working despite Pepper's glares and Bruce's logical arguments, soldiering on like a good little trooper.

He'd lost a suit on Jötunheim, so he was making up for it by building a replica and giving it a hell of a make-over. The Mark V wasn't his best work, nor his most advanced suit, but having armour that was portable had saved his life more times than he could count.

It would be wrong to say that he wasn't moping, because he was and he knew it. Everyone else did too. Pepper said that they could all recognise it in how he became more cheerful than he usually was, and that only happened when he was putting on a front. Tony replied that maybe he was chipper because he was happier, but Pepper had been debriefed on what had happened on the ice planet, and Tony was going to make sure the traitor paid - he had his eye on Clint - so she knew that was a lie. Nevertheless, he was okay. He was more than okay. He was working, perhaps a little too much, but not enough to be concerned about, and he was still eating and playing nice with the destructive time bomb in his house and SHIELD attempting to crash the party every other week or so.

And he hadn't even drowned himself in booze yet, so really, he was coping better than usual.

Or, at least he was, until Thor left. It wasn't that Tony really noticed at first, since he was a distractible person with a short attention span and a quicksilver brain which ran faster than even he could keep up with. He'd only questioned the absence three days later over breakfast, and Bruce replied whilst Steve looked at him quizzically.

"How you holding up?"

He kept on asking that, the damned mother hen, and Tony kept on replying in the exact same way. This time, however, Clint did it for him.

"He's  _fine_ , Steve, relax. Aren't you, Tony?"

"Peachy." Tony agreed. "I'm on the mend. Just look at my burns! They're going to leave some epic scars."

"Yes, thank you, Tony." Bruce said as Tony pulled up his shirt to proudly display the mess of his chest. "Just what I needed over breakfast."

"I didn't complain when you showed off your battle wounds."

"I don't have battle wounds."

"Oh. Maybe it was Clint, then."

"I definitely did that." The archer confirmed.

"I didn't mean just your body, Tony." Ah, that was good ol' Cap, always keeping focused, refusing to be distracted once he'd found a bone to pick.

"He means the fact you fell in love with the prince of the Frost Giants but tragic circumstances worthy of Shakespeare split you apart forever." Clint clarified, and Tony kicked him under the table.

"Also fine. I'm not even thinking about him." Untrue, since his thoughts flitted to Loki more than he'd like to admit, but it was honest to admit that he was managing not to think of him for longer periods of time as the weeks flew by.

"That's... good, I suppose." Steve accepted, returning to his pancakes.

Natasha eyed him, because she could spot a lie at thirty paces, but she didn't speak up. Tony appreciated that. The assassin's particularly epic wound would scar dramatically down her back, and Clint would be going through therapy for his leg when it completely healed, but Tony was proud to say his scars were the most badass. He mentioned this off-hand, prompting some serious outrage from Hawkeye who protested raucously.

However, after the stark reminder that he'd left something behind on Jötunheim, he couldn't distract himself no matter how much he tried. He had to work from scratch to push Loki forcibly out of mind, so thanks for that Rogers.

It was over a week later that Thor returned, happy and a mite victorious over something, grinning like a loon when Tony suspiciously asked him what he'd done.

"If I get the wrath of Odin raining down on my tower because you took a page out of that nutty Jötun's book, I am not going to be held responsible for your fate." Tony warned, mostly because if anything happened to her 12% baby, Pepper would forget the meaning of the word 'mercy'.

Thor did not answer him, nor would he regale his teammates with the tale of his exploits whilst he was gone. Strange, since Thor was usually so eager to entertain his company with stories, but they all quickly realised the god was also stubborn and would not back down once he'd made the decision to keep mum.

Tony received his answers sooner rather than later, nonetheless - that night, even, as he was packing up the lab for the evening.

JARVIS was powering everything down, having been the one to force Tony's hand and give up after almost ten solid hours. Tony had been stuck on the conundrum of how to make his suits significantly more heat-resistant, since the last thing he wanted was to go through that mess again. If he'd had an unmeltable suit on Jötunheim then none of that would have even happened.

At the moment, the only idea he had was to simply built the suit out of adamantium and have done with it. Tugsten at a push. Both were fairly impractical ideas, but they were the ones Tony was itching to go with. How safe he'd feel in an adamantium suit would almost be worth the hissy fit Fury would have when he found out.

"Adamantium doesn't grow on goddamn trees, Stark," Tony mimicked into the quiet room, gathering up his tablet and starting to leave. "It shouldn't be wasted just to protect  _your_  fool body." Then he turned around. And then he stopped dead.

A blue-skinned, red-eyed Frost Giant stood, slick smile familiar and body buzzing with that manic energy which defined Loki so. Tony choked on whatever words he could think to say, as the crown prince of Jötunheim just stood there, smirking dickishly, taking pleasure from the dumbfounded look on Tony's face.

And then Loki was close to him, and Tony had his arms wrapped around the taller man, pressing him close and closing his lips over the cold blue skin.

"How the hell are you here?"

"Hello to you, too." Loki smiled as they broke away from each other, dragging his lips along Tony's cheeks towards the shell of his ear.

"Thor," The human twigged, because he wasn't called a genius for nothing. "He helped to get you to Earth. But you'd still need Heimdall to-"

"Heimdall was feeling particularly abject about his actions during the war." Loki interrupted. "Or, should I say, the lack of them. I felt owed a favour, and he agreed."

"I don't believe you." Tony said, because he knew Heimdall better than that. "He wouldn't betray Odin's trust by sneaking you into the realm."

"No one needed to sneak me in. He simply let me out." Loki explained with a crafty grin. "Unfortunately, his aim was a little off. I seemed to have landed on this godforsaken realm."

Tony snorted. "Sure you did. Fine, keep your silly little secrets about how you convinced the big, scary god to help you out. I don't care."

Loki smiled, his forehead against Tony's. "Yes, you do. I can  _feel_  your brain working, trying to figure it out."

"Thor's definitely got something to do with it. He came back with a smug look on his face."

"Indeed he does. As it turns out, despite his senseless appearance, the god of thunder can be remarkably persuasive."

"I know that. Who do you think got me to agree to go to Jötunheim in the first place?"

"I'd have thought your noble Captain America played a heavy role."

"You'd be correct, but Thor got him to agree first so it is all his fault."

Throughout their conversation, Loki had yet to stop touching Tony's face with his own. Tony was wallowing in it, grinning dopily, unreasonably happy at this sudden turn of events. "Remind me to get him a gift basket or something."

"I assume you have a bedroom."

"Even us Earthlings aren't  _that_  backwards." Tony allowed, before the feeling of teleportation overtook him and he found himself being backed up towards his bed. "Hey, how long are you staying?"

Loki stopped to consider, and Tony briefly regretted asking as it hindered their progress to the mattress. On the other hand, he wasn't sure how he'd be able to deal with the constant itch of not knowing and spending every second wondering if Loki was going to disappear back home upon a sudden summons.

"I will return to Jötunheim eventually." Loki answered slowly. "But the planet has been largely reclaimed and most of the work is done. Since I am not yet king, they can do without me for a time."

"So you're not leaving in the next hour or so?"

"That is not my intention, no."

"Good, because I have some plans with you."

"I hope they don't involve the quilt on that bed," he said off-hand, eying the sheet with great distaste. "Your realm is hot enough without such nonsense."

Carding a hand through his hair, Tony pulled him close. "Make sure you're here in the winter then. You'll love New York in the snow."

It was a promise Tony hadn't seen himself offering, but one that he found himself accepting regardless. Loki only nodded, seemingly unfazed by the idea of commitment and a long-term relationship, pressing him into the sheets he so hated and sealing that oath with a kiss.

**Author's Note:**

> I decided to keep him called Loki even though he wasn't adopted by Odin just to make sure it was clear who he was and all that.


End file.
